Everybody liked this lizard

... and yesterday someone decided to buy him.  He'd been attracting admirers for a couple of months.  At every market he would be the pot that most people stopped at.  My "beastly dishes" are not for everyone: they're quite expensive because of the work of sculpting the lizard then painting in slip before firing and finally painting the lustres and the extra cost of another firing.  Also, I think people feel afraid to use them, although I always stress that they are made to be used. 

By coincidence, yesterday I also unpacked a lustre firing in which were some new items inspired by this chap.  I love the carmine lustre which I used for the spots and they just made such a hit with the other colours.  It was the first time I'd used it, so it was a bit of a gamble, but it paid off.  Inspired by the beastly pot and the attention he'd attracted, therefore, I decided to use the same theme to decorate some other pots and just as the first chap went to a new home, I unpacked the first examples of the new "range".  I say range in inverted commas because I'm not planning to make lots of the same things in this design.  I'll make some as I feel like it but I also plan to experiment with different combinations of lustres and designs within the same sort of theme.  But here are the first:

New venture

A long time ago I promised to write about the new venture I'd been busy creating and the image above (which is now reproduced as postcards amongst other things) explains all.

Well, perhaps not all.

When Gloucestershire Arts and Crafts Centre moved from its first location to a new shop, I decided not to move with it.  This was a business decision: Gloucester isn't and never has been a place where people buy a lot of domestic pottery.  When there was a Made In Gloucestershire shop in Westgate St. potters who were used to selling elsewhere in Gloucestershire found that their sales were much less frequent in Gloucester.  For me Made In Gloucestershire worked quite well because I sold a lot of greetings cards there.  At Gloucestershire Arts and Crafts Centre this didn't happen because we had a large number of very good card makers.  One in particular, whose beautiful cards I would have bought all the time if I didn't make my own, sold cards daily and the remainder of  greetings card sales were shared out between the rest of us.  Pot sales happened, but not frequently enough and the sales I made were uneconomic when set against the time spent working in the shop and other conditions of membership.  So I said goodbye.

In spite of this being a good business decision and a good life decision to be able to spend more time on making work, I was very sad about leaving GACC.  I really enjoyed being part of a large group of like-minded souls and I particularly enjoyed creating and maintaining the website.  The new shop is much smaller and I wasn't alone in deciding not to continue so that meant a large number of us no longer in the network.

So Crafts In Gloucestershire was born.  I had the idea way back in the summer and started setting it up at the beginning of September.  The website has been live for about a month and I've sent out two newsletters.  Membership is growing slowly; a large part of this is that arty types are notorious for not getting round to admin work and although I write the web pages, makers need to write their own text and sort out which pictures they'd like to use and this is another task falling just when most of us are busy making extra stock to have plenty for Christmas sales.  So, it will grow slowly but, I think, surely.


Crafts In Gloucestershire is an online directory.  It lists makers, teachers and events which fall into the arts and crafts category.  It's also a network, which means that event organisers can send us notice of craft fairs and the like, which will be passed on to all the members.  Members can contact each other, perhaps to suggest a group exhibition, or to ask for support and ideas.  I hope when there are enough of us we might have the odd social get-together.
 

As well as a page with pictures and info, makers also may have their products or events included in an occasional newsletter or mentioned on Twitter or Facebook.

I'm really rather pleased with the whole project.  I've really enjoyed designing the logos, website and publicity documents and I think I've created something which is really good value for the members.

Well, it wasn't supposed to be a sales pitch, though I suppose it might have turned out that way.  I wanted to write about it, though, because I do see it as part of my work and as such it had been occupying my mind for a while.  Setting up the website was quite time-consuming but now it's done, adding entries is not.  So far I've enjoyed planning and creating the newsletters and I must admit to being a bit of a Twitter and Facebook fan so posting there is no hardship either.

You'll have noticed the web address above, but here's a link to make it easy:

Crafts In Gloucestershire

and while you're at it, would you like to receive the newsletter?  Just email email craftsinglos@gmail.com and ask for a newsletter and it will soon be winging its way to your inbox.

New season

Even though I haven't done any school-based teaching for about four years now, Essence of Autumn Term still hovers around my life and I view September/October time as an opportunity for a new start.  At the market I often have a half-price sale in September, which although I don't advertise it as such, always figures in my mind as an end-of-season sale.  I'm not sure they have those any more.  It may be that the end of season sale is a thing of ancient history.  I'm not sixty yet, but I've already begun to notice that I know about things that actually are history to a couple of generations of people.  I suspect, though, that some of my readers are of the same generation as I am and will relate to the concept of the end of season sale.

Last week, though, was the start of the new season as far as my market appearances go, and at last the much heralded banner had its first outing, together with a new tablecloth and stall layout.  I'm very pleased with the result.

The only minor problem is with the banner.  It's perfect for a market stall, but for an indoor event it will be too tall.  The tables tend to be much nearer the ground than the market stalls.  I was also wondering how I would manage to attach the thing to a table.  Solution: I'm going to get a smaller banner made, which will attach to my tablecloths with velcro.

Actually, I'd better get a move on.  I need this all ready for 29th October.

Book Review - "Room"

I thought I had better redress the balance after my review of The Gargoyle and give an example of a book which is packed with feeling from start to finish and luckily the very next book I read was such a book.

I confess that after The Gargoyle my faith in my own ability to choose a good book had been rather damaged, so it was with a little trepidation that I began Room by Emma Donoghue.  I needn't have worried.  I read about forty pages in bed one night and then consumed the rest of the book the following day.  This is what books should be like, in my view.  I want the book to become more important than the rest of my life so that I can do nothing else until it is finished.

The first time I remember this happening very clearly was during my "A" level year, when I started reading Lord Of The Rings.  I got to a certain point in the book and realised that it was probably more productive to just abandon my studies completely until I had finished reading it than snatch hours here or there and spend the rest of the time between worrying that I wasn't studying enough and missing the book.  Since then it's been the benchmark of a really good book that it can grab me that way.


So, back to Room.  This may not be in my top ten all time books, but it's up pretty high. I remember choosing it because from the blurb, I thought it was a great "what if" plot.  I 've always been fascinated by human psychology and was looking forward to exploring the effects of an extremely unusual situation on the development of the central character, a five-year-old child.  What I wasn't expecting was to experience so much of what his mother feels as well, the more powerfully because those feelings are never described.  Through Jack's account of events we are also in touch with Ma's experience of them.  Without being over-sentimental, the story was nevertheless very moving.

*   *   *   *   *   *

I may not write any more book reviews here.  (Feedback on whether I should would be appreciated.)  As I think I've indicated, I enjoy most books I read and as I found it much, much more difficult to write about this enjoyable book than I did about the one I hated, the omens are not good.

Book Review - "The Gargoyle"

I haven't written about books here before but I've been prompted to start because of The Gargoyle.

I don't know why I bought this book.  A couple of months ago I was buying something else on Amazon and decided to treat myself to a couple of novels.  I was thinking ahead to having some holiday time and had just paid some cheques into my account and I decided I could probably afford it so long as I got on with it and spent the money on books before I noticed it was needed for something else.  The book may have been recommended to me by a friend but I'm beginning to doubt that.  Perhaps I just liked the sound of it and it was part of a "Buy all three for a knock-down price" package.

I've been gradually getting back into reading this year.  Finding the odd time to pick up a book again.  It's part of getting back a life but it's something I've found difficulty finding time for in the last six or seven years, to be honest.  As always, reading has been more concentrated into holiday time than any other time but I've mentioned that holiday time has been rather sparse round here so reading has more or less fallen by the wayside for some years.

So then The Gargoyle by Andrew Davidson fell into my lap. 

The blurb on the back uses words like "engrossing, spectacularly imaginative, extraordinary, romance".  "The pages almost turn themselves."  (What?!)  I think it's supposed, amongst other things, to be about the ultimate quality of love.  Or possibly the quality of ultimate love.

The descriptions are thorough.  Emotions of many kinds are described at great length, with detail, embellished by all the sorts of things you expect in magical realism, which should have been a warning to me as I'm not really a fan. 

I've spent the morning, the first of my holiday, finishing the book.  I always want to get to the end, to find out what's going to happen and in that respect this book was no different.  I like to tie up loose ends.  Follow the threads that start early on in the book and find out where they lead.  Well, I did that.

But I really, really disliked the book.  And this is very rare for me.  I'll read all kinds of rubbish just to find out what happens to people.

Over the past few weeks I've been wondering what it was that I was disliking but this morning it has become clear.  I didn't care about anything or anyone in the book.  I felt nothing except boredom. All that excessive description but nothing moved me.  Passion was written about but seemed to me to be entirely absent in itself.  It really felt more like an academic exercise, proof that it could be done.  I think a book should make me feel something, anything.  Writing is an art form and what's the point of any art form if it raises no reaction in the viewer?

It reminds me of a painter I knew.  He was well thought of.  Well, he was certainly well thought of by himself.  Had been to art college, studied properly and poured scorn on anyone calling themselves an artist who hadn't had that proper training.  He could execute a picture very well, no doubt about that.  When I looked at his pictures, though, I always thought, "Why?"  "What did you feel that prompted you to paint this picture?"  or even "What am I supposed to feel when I look at this picture?"

The Gargoyle is rather the same.  Yes, it's possibly clever, ties in all kinds of different layers of things which have been well researched.  It may even be well written. 

But why?

So, what's next?

What's next?  I'm just embarking on two weeks' holiday.  I'm not going anywhere.  I'm just not going to be working. I don't think I've had a holiday for at least two years.

I would say that I can't believe we're approaching the middle of September, but of course I can.  I know some of the things I did during the summer and even during the last six weeks or so since I last wrote here.An example of which is shown above.  The vegetable plot has been a success so far this year.  This particular day (Wednesday last week) was the best crop of beans ever but there have been many good days.  If bored with beans we can eat courgettes (can't everyone!) or swede.  We had carrots when they needed thinning but I'm letting them get a bit bigger now.  Spinach looks as if it will get going soon.  Sprouts and purple sprouting plants are beginning to look established.  And finally, only a few months late, I planted out my leeks.  I've no idea if the leek moth still considers it to be summer and is therefore still on the prowl for leeks but I'm not taking chances and have covered the whole bed in agricultural fleece.  It's said to be the only way to keep the buggers off, so we'll see if it works.  I do miss a good crop of home-grown leeks.

So, that's some of what I've been doing.  I've also been making pots, getting back into dog-walking (sometimes) and better quality cooking, and working at and for Gloucestershire Arts and Crafts Centre, of which I've written previously. 

The centre has now closed at its previous location.  It's moving to a smaller and more manageable premises in a better spot for footfall, hopefully, but I am  not moving with it.  Gloucester has never been a great place to sell pottery and if I'd had my sensible head on at all I wouldn't have let myself be persuaded to join the centre at all, let alone have ended up doing as much work for it as I did.  Don't get me wrong - it was a great place and we achieved a remarkable amount there, and I'm proud to have been part of the team that did that.  But it wasn't good for me personally.  Too much work for very little reward in terms of sales. 

The best thing about being involved at the centre, though, was getting to know a whole bunch of arty people that I didn't know already.  There were some people I did know from previous connections but over the eighteen months but I also met many new friends and really enjoyed being part of a group.  I'll miss that, and that has prompted me to start a new venture ....  no, I think I'll save that for another time.

So what's next is that with the extra time I'll be gaining by not working at and for the centre, I'm determined to catch up with the backlog of pottery production.  I've also got ideas for new embroidered canvasses.  I want to start a new silk-painting project, again that will have to wait for another time before I disclose the secret.  When I've time, I've got some great ideas for a small range of table linen to complement my pottery, too.

What's that you say?  Holiday?  Not working?  Ah yes.  It's an odd feeling.

I think I'm going to like it, though.

A tomato conundrum

Anyone kind enough to follow this blog may be forgiven for wondering whether, after all that, I actually grew anything in my fabulous new greenhouse.  Well, yes.  I've started.  I don't expect to use it to its full potential until retirement or at least semi-retirement but once we knew we were staying here for the summer, I set about sowing my usual quantities of tomatoes.

I usually grow three varieties:

Sungold is a cherry tomato that ripens to a glowing orange colour and is the sweetest tomato I have ever tasted.  As such, I suppose it might not be to everyone's taste, but we both love them and can happily eat them like sweets.  The plants grow like stink (how nice to be able to use that possibly antiquated but punchy little phrase) so I plant them at the front of the tomato area where the roof is of course higher.  In the old greenhouse they grew further and I used to have them trained along the cross-pieces but this greenhouse has a higher roof so I don't know if they'll grow quite so tall.

I then grow two other varieties, a standard tomato and a plum tomato.  These I choose from the wondrous variety offered by Franchi (Seeds of Italy)  whose seeds, I may have mentioned before, are always of excellent quality and arrive in plenteous quantities too.  I can't remember which two varieties I have this year.  It's not relevant to the conundrum.

So, I have 26 tomato plants arranged in two rows of thirteen.  Starting one variety from the back left and Sungold from the front left and then the third variety filling up the end section front and back.  There are eight of the back row plants and ten Sungold in front. 

The plants were all potted up in one session.  I started with a stack of pots and an open bag of compost.  When the bag ran out (halfway through potting up one variety) I opened another.  After they were all potted up in three little groups I arranged the plants as described above.  Patience, patience, there is a point to these tedious details.

For a few weeks I got on with watering with a watering can.  When I remembered to water I watered the whole lot, starting at one end and doing front/back, front/back until the watering can was empty and then refilling and continuing.  Usually two cans full did it, occasionally the last two plants had to start a third.


So you see, the way the plants have been raised and treated (identically), there seems to be no logical explanation why the eight on the left (some of variety A and some of variety B) are dark green and healthy looking and the eighteen on the right (some each of varieties A, B and C) pale and slightly sickly looking.  The only difference is that the eight on the left are standing between the legs of a new staging frame while those on the right are between the legs of the old staging frame.

I'm flummoxed. 

Explanations and, even more so, suggestions about a remedy if one is available and would be beneficial, gratefully received.