Bold and cheerful aluminium jewellery.

I thought that I would post something bright and cheerful to counteract the grey drizzly day outside. I wanted to get out in my studio and finish a commission for a really big Green man in pewter - but dad, who has been itching to re do the roof out there, forced it on us this morning - now it is raining - I am trying hard not to be grumpy .............I know my dad can start a project then get sidetracked for a couple of years - lets face it - I am still waiting for the dolls house furniture he promised me when I was about 6!     ........... I really want my entire familly to leave me alone so that I can get all my orders up straight! 

 Hmmm anyone out there got any ideas how to turn the grumps arround and make it in to creativity?

Market Places, Public Places.

Traditional markets have declined in recent years for all sorts of reasons including the bad press they have received and their portrayal in the media as scummy places full of rogues. It is certainly true that markets have harboured dodgy traders but overall they have been vibrant places that have injected energy and excitement into many towns and cities. Nearly all the older towns of England are referred to as 'Market Towns' for good reason. Market days were special. They were not only days for shopping but for socialising. Pubs and cafes were buzzing, the streets were noisy with banter, greetings and gossip. You could take your goods and produce and be a seller yourself. Money taken would circulate locally. The markets also provided  great deal of informal employment  for young people and older people who did not have regular employment. To use modern jargon, they were 'inclusive'.

Compare this with modern shopping centres. They are privatised spaces the sole purpose of which is to relieve customers of their money. If they don't have money they are not wanted. Only chain stores can afford the rents for the shop units. Goods are probably made in China. The money taken is paid into the accounts of large businesses. There is no local input. There is no informal employment. They are dead places. Night comes, they are locked up. Security guards patrol.

I can't help making a connection between shopping in these modern hell zones with the current sorry state of our street life with all its anti-social behaviour that culminated in last weeks riots.

When we started to stand market thirty two years ago [!] in Leicester the town centre market was thriving. Nearly every trader had several people working for him or her. The traders and their employees all spent money on the market themselves. Bus routes converged on the market. Saturday  afternoons were wonderful. It felt like being at a big party. There was  tremendous bustle and noise. If you stopped and listened it sounded like chips being fried: thousands of words being exchanged. It was a public space full of lively interaction. We loved it. Apart from anything else it was a great social life. The three lads that we employed in succession later become close friends. They have fond memories of all the banter, the incidents that occurred, the characters that wandered about the market [including some with mental health problems that we gave informal support to]. It was  an important part of our friends' education. It was a situation in which money wasn't everything.

Where, now, can a young person acquire such a rich experience?  I don't know. Sadly markets such as Leicester are a pale shadow of what  they used to be. The lifeblood has been sucked from them by the decline of public transport, the decline of public spaces and the decline of town centres. I can't help thinking that this is linked to public behaviour and the ethos of our time which is that money is everything.

If we could revive our street markets and other public spaces I feel sure that England would become a happier place. I still stand market. It probably doesn't make sense from a purely economic view but there is still real life to be enjoyed there, real people having real conversations and I still love doing it.

Where do we stand?

Friday: Stamford Market opposite the museum [now closed due to 'cuts']
Saturday: Melton Mowbray opposite  Ye Olde Porke Pie Shoppe.
Sunday: Cambridge. Market Place next to the granite fountain and Cafe Mobile.

Visit. Hear me rant in person!

Busy swallows

We woke to a cold rainy morning here, the sort of fine rain that wets you through and gets in everywhere, the sort of rain that makes standing out on a market stall totally miserable and spoils the stock to boot!
Decision made - we return to bed with steaming mugs of tea, magazines and books.....................I fell back to sleep and dreamed of a camping holiday on the edge of a wide deep river, I am able to dive in, swimming out to where the water is deeper than any I have been in - I know this because it is crystal clear, I worry that I won't be able to stay afloat but am woken by a delivery man hammering at the door, cross and very, very wet.
Funny isn't it - when some cultures have so many different names for snow, why haven't we Brits got more names for rain?

                                          Birds on a wire.

When the rain stopped I noticed what were seemingly rows of smartly dresed little gentlemen in black tailcoats and crisp starched shirts all chittering and practicing their semaphore on the cables outside. Sadly my cameras zoom is not good enough to capture them and many flew away the moment I stepped outside.........

Magical moment.

More and more birds arrived and settled in the Rowan tree across the paddock, every so often swooping away, swirling and diving, circling up and then back for a while to the wires and the Rowan.

I crept upstairs to try and get a better shot, when this little fellow stopped on the edge of the open window. I don't know who was more surprised, him or me!

Another lineup.

No doubt mustering themselves ready for the long flight back to Africa! I am always so sad to see then go watching their aeronautic displays fills me with joy...............but again it is such a pleasure to spot the first one back in the spring!

Sharon.

Nightmares of Yi Wu

Sunday 31st July: driving home up The Great North Road [sounds more romantic than the A1], good mood having had a nice day at Cambridge. Tune in to Radio 4 Pick of the Week which is generally enjoyable and relaxing.

Not this week however. An extract from a programme 'The new Silk Road', etches itself into my neural circuitry. It is about Yi Wu, city from which all sorts of goods are exported. The old trade routes, such as The Silk Road, used to carry silks, porcelain, spices, and all kinds of exotic goods, but not the ones emanating from Yi Wu.

The presenter of the programme describes the vast trading emporiums contained in nightmarishly gigantic buildings whose ground plans are equivalent to some large number of football pitches. These emporiums are stocked with plastic novelties of all kinds: Christmas baubles and lights, plastic fruit, religious kitsch for Lourdes, Graceland, India and the Middle East, nasty hair goods, costume jewellery and so on. The presenter is doing 'being amazed' at the diversity of products and their sheer quantity.

But I don't find it amazing, I find it horrifying. I can't help going through in my mind the processes that are occurring and contemplating the waste of human and natural resources involved, and the resultant pollution. Here's my brief analysis of what happens:

Oil extracted from the ground

Oil converted into plastic pellets.

Plastic pellets used in moulding machines to make components.

Components assembled into goods by bored, alienated human beings ['labour'].

Goods sold by exporters to wholesalers all over the world.

Wholesalers sell goods to retailers.

Retailers sell to customers.

Customers use and discard.

Goods dumped.

At each stage CO2 is released, money is exchanged, taxes and bank charges are paid. At each stage low paid workers perform the necessary physical tasks -assembling, packaging, carrying, sweeping up and so on [this could be a very long list, please feel free to use your imagination to extend it and to consider what it feels like to be the person who has to do these jobs]. At each stage some kind of clerical work is done: computers buzz, invoices are filled out, accounts completed.



At the later stages of all this 'a consumer' 'consumes' and once the article is 'consumed' it is got rid of. It may be be recycled but, more likely it will be dumped and end up as landfill.


All this is classed as 'economic activity' and regarded as a 'good thing' by politicians. But to me it is a nightmare of exploitation and pollution

Contrast this with the production of Sharon's pewter pictures:

We look through art books.

We take a walk in the country and take some photos of, say, an oak tree or an ivy leaf.

We sit in our kitchen make sketches, talk about the design, drink tea.

Sharon cuts out her piece of pewter. I make more tea. We listen to Radio 4 or a talking book.

I take the finished piece out to market.

I talk to lots of people.

I sell the piece.

It is put on some one's wall and is admired and enjoyed.

It stays there for a long time. Quite a few people now collect Sharon's work [unlike the goods from Yi Wu].

At any stage the materials we use can be recycled.

All this is part of an economic process, albeit a small part, but it is so much more. Enjoyment is present at each stage of the process. Sharon loves making things. I love being out on markets. Our customers get pleasure out of what we make. Please draw your own conclusions

These matters were much discussed in Victorian times particularly by John Ruskin and William Morris. I think the latter's oft quoted dictum is worth repeating:

'Have nothing in your house that you do not to be useful or believe to be beautiful.'

Perhaps I'd better go and do some housework now. Hmm...check for the useful and beautiful?