They take away our belts so that we must holdOur trousers up. The truly mad don’t botherAnd thus are oddly hobbled. Also our lacesSo that our shoes do flop about our feet.so begins Anthony Hecht’s poem ‘Coming Home’ [1976], a creative retelling of the English poet John Clare’s escape from an asylum house in Essex back to his ‘homeland’ in Northamptonshire, in the summer of 1841 [from John Clare’s journals].but what connection does this excerpt from a poem have with a bright blustery morning in early may?well, out of the blue, the picture editor of The Times Literary Supplement [TLS] contacted me and asked if they could use a picture of mine to accompany a poem by John Clare as the ‘Poem of the Week’.the request was for something “wild and woody”, as they liked my ‘Clare inspired’ sketchbook paintings in this journal [blog]. i hadn’t conceived of these painting sketches as outwardly ‘clare-inspired’ but i had, in a curious inversion, quoted a couple of lines from John Clare’s poem ‘The Progress of Rhyme’ to accompany the sequence of paintings from some muddy and muted days in winter.maybe it was something to do with seeking hope, on the horizon, escaping to the country, side-tracked, down a country lane, a nearby hill, the corner of a field, or down on the marsh - all reflected back in jaded eyes. an overwhelming sense of 'enclosure' in these agricultural landscapes could make anyone go a little stir-crazy after a while, but in John Clare's poem i was reminded that sometimes it’s small nature that grasps and grounds you. one can easily ramble on about these things, it’s a common side-effect of the ruralist condition.‘the progress of rhyme’ is, as the title suggests, a poem about poetry: nature as muse, his enduring love for 'poesy’ as he terms it, intertwined with memories of past acquaintances, the indifference and fickleness of others, finding beauty in weeds, uplifted by birdsong - “cheer-up cheer-up cheer-up”, solace and joy in nature. it goes on. & on, & on [with quite a lot of curly ampersands en route]‘the progress of rhyme’ is also a poem that requires repeated reading, not only because it is quite long and there is a quirky dialect to be deciphered in the words, grammar and spelling, but because with each reading a short rhyme might chime out with new resonance.whenever i take time out to skim through the two books of John Clare’s poems i have, there is always an interesting pause for thought in the wider narrative. maybe this is the nature of poetry - you read what you need - as i must confess i have not yet read all of the poems, nor have i fully comprehended them in the academic literary sense.but i must get back to the original back-story, for this is not about 'the progress of rhyme', but another poem…in reply to the enquiry from the TLS, i sent them pictures of five landscape painting sketches for consideration, not knowing which John Clare poem they might be associated with. naturally, i was flattered by the picture request even though no fee was involved, as i like john clare's poetry, and oddly, maybe it would be some good exposure for a hermit artist [i'm not really a hermit, it just appears that way in comparison to other artists' lives].then a small muddle-up occurred as it transpired that the ‘poem of the week’ wasn’t going to be a John Clare poem after all, but a poem inspired by Clare’s ‘Journey out of Essex’. i had not previously heard of the poet Anthony Hecht, but have discovered via the wonder of the worldwide web he is/was a prestigious american poet [now deceased]. i was still happy with the picture agreement.i later emailed a friend who has more literary connections - they have worked in graphic design & book publishing, and are currently working on illustrations for a new book of poems - and i said that i found it unusual that a small wintery bleak painting of mine was chosen to illustrate a journey taken in summer time. they replied: he sleeps in ditches. this sounds reasonable, but i wouldn't want my painting to be interpreted that things had got that bad. in any case, ditches can be beautiful in summer, overgrown with the tall, swaying fluffy-ended stems of meadowsweet.after re-reading the poem, the contrast made more sense: John Clare’s escape from the mental asylum to a place called home, as reinterpreted by Hecht in ‘Coming Home’, is a solitary and inhospitable journey: he travels wearily “by the dark of night”, the trees in the landscape are “unimaginably black and flat” against the grey sky, puddles are “flagstones of silver”, he goes hungry, takes a nap in a ditch, is “troubled by uneasy dreams”, forgets he has a wife and child, and still holds on to the hope that when he arrives ‘home’…here is the link to the full poem mentioned at the beginning, 'Coming Home' by Anthony Hecht, in The Times Literary Supplement: [http://www.the-tls.co.uk/tls/public/article1552228.ece]some other sources of information found on the internet this week:Interview: Anthony Hecht, The Art of Poetry N0. 40, the Paris Review: http://www.theparisreview.org/interviews/2487/the-art-of-poetry-no-40-anthony-hechtJohn Clare Cottage, Helpston: http://www.clarecottage.org...[note to self: there are probably some inconsistencies in using capitals, with regard to my usual ‘house style’ of typing][another thought: as a result of the general election here in the UK this week, a cloud of despondency has descended upon the liberal and left-leaning voters of the population. five more years of austerity. any analogy will do….]
thirteen
six and seven [or seven and six]...
makes thirteen:[...]
fragments #19, 2014: £15collage on black card, 41mm x 39mm, card 15cm x 15cm, with gold envelope[...]
fragments #22, 2014: £15collage on black card, 40mm x 43mm, card 15cm x 15cm, with gold envelope[...]see more... postcard sale
home correspondence
a good artist friend has sent me some pictures of one of her recent sculptural assemblages with one of my miniature abstract collages - comparing the surface, colour and texture of the small sculpture with the collage: blue, pale green, grey, rusty red-brown.
it was a lovely surprise to see one of my tiny collage cards now in a picture frame next to hazel’s sculpture.
this delightful 'boat' sculpture is constructed from a rusty spade* as its sail, fixed to a small piece of driftwood. my small abstract collage is made from paper and card fragments [art studio detritus].
this very small collage is is about 3cm square, one of thirty abstract collages on A6 postcards that i created for the 2013 artworks exhibition. the artworks exhibition has a popular 'art shop' where visitors can buy postcards, small paintings, original prints, drawings, sculpture, etc - the small things you might see and like at an 'open studio' event. i made more collages, this time on square cards, for the 2014 artworks exhibition. many people seemed to like these tiny collages, which was heartening.most of my artwork is quite subtly textured, or created in relief, and sometimes muted in colour, and it doesn't translate naturally into flat, printed cards and postcards. i'm more naturally inclined to make artworks as cards, or cards as small artworks. i have also framed a few of these very small collages [as seen in previous blog posts].it is always pleasing to see art in situ, at home in someone else's home, how it corresponds and connects to the surroundings. curiously, this aspect of art and the home came up in conversation this week with another artist friend: how and where you live, and how it influences or reflects your art in some way. i don't think i could ever live and work in two separate places [well, no further than the end of the garden!].inevitably, this got me thinking more about art and life, how one thing feeds naturally into another, the correspondences between the life we live, the things we see, the things we collect, the things we like and love, the things we make and do - it is an ever-evolving symbiotic relationship. if it is disrupted, it takes some time to rediscover and nurture a 'creative space', be it physical [a room] or in the mind [of ideas].relatedly, last week, another artist i know had mentioned in casual conversation my artwork from the 90s - my detritus collage - and whether i had considered doing more of that kind of work [it seems like decades ago, now - and it was!!]. i still have a habit of 'collecting' small random things from walks and my travels - all the artists i know do this - artists are natural magpies.well, dear reader [i think that's me, mostly!], this concludes today's home correspondence.back to the wonderful rusty boat. hazel has a marvellous art studio, spacious and full of light, filled with beach-combing finds, which are often transformed into small sculptures. many of them, like the boat pictured, are created while staying at the coast. you can see more of hazel’s paintings and sculptures on her website. http://www.hazelbignell.co.uk/