Taking off and Landing

It's late August and holiday season. I too have been away and come home again. Now my home and the familiar places that I inhabit have become even more special because of this excursion. Going away and coming home allows us to glimpse a different perspective on our everyday living choices and I think once in a while, that's a good thing. For me it has confirmed all that I appreciate in my little part of the country and also made me re-look at my chosen lifestyle. It has highlighted some wonderful aspects of my everyday life that I had forgotten, that had got buried in the daily, consistent, repetitive and yet much needed domestic routines.

Finding my feet, in a new place.

I think going away can be a holiday from your everyday self, as immersed in the new, unfamiliar and strange, it begins to dawn on you what really matters and what doesn't. This was one of my greatest insights on the trip. That, and the realisation that even though we had travelled many miles to get to this new place, ( Quebec) a lot of it was familiar. That in itself was a comfort as I realised the Northern Hemisphere is my land, and as I looked up as the skies darkened I could still pick out familiar star constellations such as 'The Plough', Cassiopeia and the North Star.

Familiar flowers in a new world. Kamouraska, Quebec, Canada.

I could recognise a lot of the plants, trees and animals in this new place too. But the birds were a constant vocal reminder we were somewhere else. There were many melodies and calls that I heard that were new and totally unfamiliar. We are wont to forget about our everyday sound-scape, so much so that we may not even hear it any more due to its repetitiveness and familiarity. 

The great St. Lawrence river. Just beautiful, it reminded me of home and my love of estuaries.

Since returning home I have visited my local library and started reading a very interesting and lovingly written book about bird song. 'A Sweet, Wild Note', by Richard Smyth which has reinforced some of the beliefs that I have had since a child and has also opened up a whole new world to me.

'Listening to birdsong..is a means of orientation; it's embedded in habitat, landscape and place.'

The Swale estuary at Oare, Faversham, Kent on a walk when I returned.

It has been nearly 2 weeks since we landed and I now feel that I am home. I have walked in many of my favourite places and re-aquainted myself with their details and nuances. I am enjoying the physical sense of feeling grounded and of this place. Added to this, I can compare, contrast and remember the other places and people and their culture. These memories are precious and they will stay with me as long as I can hold them. Last weekend we compiled and edited the hundreds of photographs that we had taken whilst away and this will help me to remember and hopefully keep that valuable new perspective for a bit longer.

View of sunset from our beach hut, Tankerton, Kent, last week.

A new but strangely familiar sunset view from the Gaspe peninsular, Quebec.

I love to teach others and facilitate space for them to create, so I run art and design workshops in my own straw-bale studio throughout the year. These can be either 1:1 or for a small group.

The next ones for the exciting and accessible art of Gelli-printing are on most Wednesdays and Fridays throughout September and October. They run 11-2pm and cost £40 pp including all materials and refreshments. Call or text 07432679164 if you would like to be booked in or email me at clare@people-to-place.co.uk

This is my website, it has more information about what I do and why. www.people-to-place.co.uk

Nostalgia and Familiarity.

I have been keeping myself distracted from world events by going out walking, planning and making artwork and re-reading wonderful books about seasonal living in the towns and villages of the British countryside.

I wonder whether this is truly healthy. Certainly the walking part is, there has been research published recently by Public Health England that walking for just 10 minutes each day can add many benefits to your life including a 15% reduction in the risk of dying prematurely. (Shockingly, PHE said 41% of middle aged adults, (6 million) walk less than 10 minutes continuously each month.)

Walking is so much more fun in a friendly group.

But, bathing myself in nostalgia; re-reading country living tales from the earlier part of the last century? Perhaps not, but a daily dose of a chapter before bed, makes the 10 O' Clock news far less terrifying and I sleep well.

Alice Puttullo's work at YSP. Wallpaper, fireplace, pictures and mantelpiece ornaments.

Making artwork has taken a break this summer as I juggle childcare and work but I have many plans for when I feel freer which isn't not long now, I know this as I have been counting the days. I want to start a new project this November called 'Hearth and Home', it's in its planning stage at the moment, but that is a very exciting place to be. I want to move on from the Spirit of Place project and look at our relationship to home. I was taken by Alice Pattullo's 'Of House and Home' exhibition on show at the YSP last month, (see the last blog for more information on this.)

Dalmation mantelpiece ornament.

This year I have had a log burner installed into my home and I am already looking forward to the colder weather and an excuse to create a fire in my living room. This warm heart to the home is just waiting to be lit. Heart and hearth are such similar words that I guess they must have a common origin. It is this type of enquiry that will push my research forward and create images and written work that will fill up another large reflective journal, or two...

King Charles dog, Staffordshire pottery card replica.

One of the books I have been seeking solace in is more contemporary but still has the same feel of the older books. 'Village People' by the late Paula Yates is a wonderful perceptive and sometimes poignant view of her and her family’s move from full time London living to settling into the more seasonal and small town world of Faversham. Compton Pauncefoot is the literary name that she rechristens it with, but her love of the place comes through and her descriptions of the passing of the seasons, local events and beautiful nature writing is reminiscent of one of her writing heroines, Miss Read.

'Village People', Paula Yates

Describing the allotments by Davington pond she writes, 'A few of the brave locals willing to risk heat stroke were stripped to the waist and feeding bottles of beer to giant marrows the size of small pigs; one sat looking wistfully at an onion the same size as a small bungalow in Southport.'

Susan Hill, the writer behind the terrifying 'The Woman in Black', wrote a beautiful book in 1982 that I cherish. It is called 'The Magic Apple Tree- a country year', she paints the village year in glowing colours, the people, the events and the familiarity and celebration of the seasons. It is her story of moving into the countryside and becoming happily immersed in its rhythms.

She writes, 'Summer did come at last and, when it did, it was one of those summers of poems and stories and country pictures, a once-upon-a-time summer, it was hot day after day, week after week, so that we slipped into a dream, where we imagined it never ending, a paradise world of long, golden days.'

'The Magic Apple Tree', Susan Hill

Another two wonderful writers of this genre are, obviously, Miss Read and Alison Uttley. If you are feeling a need for distraction from the news at the moment I heartily recommend a nostalgic break by reading 'Thrush Green' or 'A Country Child' as soon as possible. One dose of this before bed will allow escapism, encourage wonder at the natural world and hopefully induce a peaceful nights sleep!

'Thrush Green', Miss Read

I will be opening the doors of my beautiful straw bale studio once again this year to exhibit my own and Alison Lees work as part of the Canterbury Festival, the theme is still 'The Spirit of Place' as it is an ongoing art project based in Kent.

You can keep up to date with our explorations and discoveries by looking at www.facebook.com/EastKentSpiritOfPlace

Open times are 11-5 daily on the weekends from 14-29^th of October. We can be found at house number 25 on the Whitstable trail. Please see the webpage www.ekoh.org.uk for more information.

 I can be contacted on 07432679164 or clare@people-to-place.co.uk

Familiarity

Familiarity

I have just come back from a 5 day break in Cadiz. It was the third time I have visited this beautiful city and at last I felt a sense of familiarity with its streets. The first time I visited I remember thinking this was an impossibility.

At home in Cadiz.

The streets seemed to have no plan, they criss-crossed the peninsular, some stopped abruptly in a dead end whilst others opened up unexpectantly onto tree filled squares. In my imagination I had compared this place to a cleaner, friendlier and sunnier version of Terry Pratchett’s Discworld city, Ankh Morpork.

A typical street in Cadiz.

The difference between orientating yourself in a northern European city and this one, 59 miles away from Tangiers, Africa as I see it is one of scale and proportion. The climate and topography are obviously very different and these factors have influenced the evolution of the street system, the buildings and therefore our familiarity with its form.

Details of places once visited become familiar landmarks.

Cadiz gets very hot and one way of creating shady passageways amongst the city is to build taller buildings, close together, so that the sea air is funnelled through the streets, allowing for a cooler more comfortable city environment.

Looking up.

I have grown up in the UK where in comparison, the climate and topography is variable and in general the streets are wider and buildings lower than those in Cadiz and this allows landmarks to be more easily recognised from a distance.

Path in the Botanical gardens.

Whether they are manmade or natural these landmarks have given me a spatial awareness by which I have been able to map my environment. Even in a city like London, the vista is wide enough to be able to pinpoint a landmark and orientate myself. The scale of London is larger than that of Cadiz which is more of a pedestrian or human scale model.

Orientation

One of the difficulties of navigating around Cadiz is that it is set out on a peninsular away from the mainland of Spain. This creates many views through the streets that look similar; multiple narrow streets have a brilliant glow at the end, as the space becomes expansive and the sun on the ocean glints in the distance.

Looking out to sea.

Laurie Lee in his novel, ’As I Walked Out One Midsummer Morning’ described the city well.

‘ Cadiz, from a distance, was a sharp incandescence, a scribble of white on a sheet of blue glass, lying curved on the bay like a scimitar and sparkling with African light.’

His other descriptions of the city are detailed and don’t paint the place as a pleasant destination at all. I am glad to say that it has changed; it is quite beautiful and charming now, with wonderful architecture, food and culture.

Door detail.

But on this visit, once I had relooked at my old map and taken note of the shape of the peninsular and remembered familiar ‘hang-outs’ from previous years, (such as various bars, the beach and market areas), it took me a while to orientate myself but then it was clear! I continued to add information on this trip to my past knowledge of the place and suddenly it felt familiar.

Detail from one of the many church facades.

This was a very comforting feeling to achieve and made me realise once again how important my project could be, connecting people to place through walking, discovering or rediscovering their locality.

Festivals and Rituals

The reason why I have visited Cadiz so often in the last few years is because of my interest in Flamenco. I have always loved the music and costume, so when a teacher offered classes in flamenco movement 5 years ago, I joined up. Four years ago we travelled out to Jerez, a neighbouring town of Cadiz and participated in our first Feria.

The Feria at Jerez is a place to promenade.

The history of the ‘Feria de Caballo’, (Jerez horse fair), goes back to over 500 years ago, when it was the location for a livestock fair, which ran from April to September. Over time it grew in popularity and stands were put up by local wine and sherry producers to sell to the spectators and participants. The specific dates are based on a three week timescale after Semana Santa, (the week leading up to Easter Sunday.)

Promenading by day and night.

People in this area have connected to the place where they live by participating in this event each year, watching the horses parade up and down the park and dancing Sevillanas in the surrounding ‘casetas’. This shared experience of an annual event is valuable to a community in many ways. It can bring people together, build community, encourage pride in a place and also inspire tourists to visit.

Flamenco costume in Cadiz streets.

During my MA study I researched the history of connection to the land through ritual use, including processional movement, symbolic landscape markers and ceremonial gatherings. The feria at Jerez was very interesting to visit with these aspects in mind.

Here in the UK there were many more annual festivals that have been lost. One I am particularly aware of was the ‘Scouring of the White Horse’ at Uffington in Oxfordshire. Thomas Hughes of ‘Tom Brown’s School Days’ fame, wrote a book with this title back in 1859 and depicts the ceremonial annual practice of scouring the chalk cut horse, so that its white shape can be seen with greater clarity from a distance.

The ceremonial path at Avebury has inspired me to paint.

The artist Paul Nash took this photo, he was also fascinated by the chalk white horse.

There is an Iron Age fort up on the hill, just above the chalk figure, it was in this enclosure, named ‘Uffington Castle’, that the festivities took place. His book details all the merry goings on and is an interesting read.

Midsummer

Next month it will be midsummer and yet again I will quietly lead a group of people up along a section of the Salt Way path to light a fire and enjoy being in that moment at that place. Over the last few years it has become even more special as I share the experience with others and they all add their own trace and story to the route.

The section of the Salt Way that we walk at Midsummer.

One lady introduced her daughter to the walk last year and they both shared a very special experience as the sun set and we sat around the fire at the top of the hill. The journey back down was lovely as the lanterns lit up the procession and people were chatting happily as fireworks went off in the distance at the harbour. I am sure this year will be wonderful again for the participants and any potential onlookers.