Tag: Life

Sculpted Steel

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Charis Jones is a blacksmith and sculptor who runs Sculpted Steel at the Etruria Forge in Etruria Stoke-on-Trent. She is based in the Forge and can be contacted to commission sculptural work. She created a large cat sculpture for our garden.

This weekend she was demonstrating her skills during a steaming weekend at The Etruria Industrial Museum. Home of Jessie Shirley’s bone and flint mill.

The beam engine that powers the flint grinding pans is steamed about once a month.

As with other places in the potteries this is one of those hidden gems that people don’t know about but which are fascinating to visit

Photos courtesy my friend Lorraine.

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Waiting room gallery

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If you go into Longport in the potteries (Stoke-on-Trent) and turn off the main road towards the station you will find a new artists led gallery.

The place only opened up this weekend but they have had lots of visitors and sales. There is art by a number of local fine artists for sale. I could not resist asking if I can place some work there and maybe hold an exhibition there.

The gallery is across the road from a shop called cherished chimneys which sells ornamental chimney pots, there was also a sign for a teapot exhibition on another building, and the station building at Longport is also being used as a gallery.

Despite losing City if Culture for 2021 I think artists in the area are proving just what a cultural, artistic city we are.

Plastic in my garden

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My partners been out putting seeds in the garden, pottering with plant pots and sitting in a chair in the sun.

Two magpies are trying to pull twigs off a buddlea Bush, they are building a raggadey nest in the top of one of the trees. They managed to break off 3 or 4 twigs while we watched.

It was so nice I decided to take a few photos. The first is the chair my partner was sitting in. He didn’t want his photo taken second is the cherry tree. With blossom buds about to burst. The third is another tree at the side of the garden, with a great big waving piece of white plastic in the top of it! I don’t know how it got there but I think it must have blown up in a storm. It doesn’t look like a plastic bag, maybe some plastic wrapping? Things are getting green. We need to wash plastic flower pots to reuse them, but I caught my partner burning perfectly good ones! Grr….

Wild and wet

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Looking out of the side window  yesterday, you can see why I didn’t want to go outside! It being the 4th of April, I was hoping things would dry and sunny. But no. On the TV there were photos of snow in Shropshire. The weather was swirling round a hook of cloud scooting across the British Midlands.

Last night when we went out to the theatre the wind and rain were awful. There were gusts of wind that blew my umbrella inside out. I could have thrown it away but despite the supports being bent out of shape the fabric kept the freezing wind off us. My partner bent down and walked behind me…. If we had been in costume we could have been a pantomime horse!

Today there was sunshine this morning but its turned very dark and cloudy. I’m guessing it’s going to tip it down again soon.

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War horse

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I don’t have any photos but I did a quick sketch from my memory of the horse in Warhorse that I went to see tonight.

The play starts with a puppet foal which is quite small. The story shows him being bought and then brought up on a farm in England in 1914. Suddenly the foal becomes a fully grown horse. He is sent along with thousands or possibly millions of horses across to be part of the cavalry in the First World War.

The story charts what happened to him and also his owner who enlists so he can find him.

The horses in the play are depicted by puppets which contain two puppeteers inside them and one moving the head and neck. In scenes where he is galloping extra puppeteers move the four feet. The horses move in realistic ways, flicking it’s ears, moving it’s tail. Rearing and bucking.

There are sections of horrific violence but through it all there is a strong streak of humanity. There are good and bad on both sides. I found myself enthralled  The play seemed to fly by.

I need to mention the other puppets, the goose, swallows flying on the wing, and a first World War tank that were  so well used to depict reality. You forgot there were puppeteers, you just saw the things they were meant to represent. If you get a chance to see it, its worth it.

Urban murals

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Here are two murals in Stoke Town centre (or Stoke-upon-Trent) one of the six towns that make up Stoke-on-Trent.

The market is mostly held inside this building with food stalls including fish and meat. Clothes stalls and all sorts of other merchandise.

Several years ago (almost 40) the old market burnt down. I remember sitting in a friends garden and seeing the plume of black smoke flowing high up into the sky. The cause? An electrical fault. The site was cleared but the local Labour Party fought for it to be rebuilt and a few years later the new market rose on a part of the site near the old market hall. There followed a library and council buildings. Nowadays the market is less busy. More shops are closing in the town. Cuts to local government are affecting the jobs in the town and city. Services have been slashed because of austerity measures bought in after the 2010 general election. The cuts really bit when the local administration went over to a Conservative and independent coalition.

Maybe one day things will improve. In the meantime it’s good to see the vibrant murals on the market building.

Partner

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Well it’s a reasonable attempt at a portrait as he was moving for most of it. Bug I do think he looks like a tired Liam Neilson! We’ve been together for almost 40 years. A lifetime. We’ve both changed. Got older and creakier. I think I’m lucky being the younger one. But I do want him to stay healthy and enjoy his life. Today was his birthday so I took him out for lunch and to a garden centre. His choice of present? Compost and a brazier to burn garden rubbish in. We’ll practical at least. Tonight we might go out again, or a takeaway. Then we have a couple of other entertaining things to do later in the week.