Highlights from 2016 – Spring

Tags

bluebells, flour, mill, mill pond, Minsmere, Pakenham Watermill, sculpture, The Albert Memorial, The Royal Albert Hall, The Victoria and Albert Museum, This is How it Feels Inspiral Carpets, wedding, wild flowers

This, as promised in my previous post, is the first of my ‘highlight’ posts in which I will let you know some of the things we managed to do this year and will provide photos and links when and where necessary.

Just after Easter we went to the wedding of my dear friend Wendy and her husband John’s daughter Jennifer to her fiancé David.  The wedding took place in the lovely church of St David in the village of Groes Faen in south Wales.  We were delighted to be included in their family celebration, just as we had been when Jen’s older sister Vicky (my God-daughter) was married a few years ago.  The reception was at the Pencoed House Estate, a beautiful manor house in lovely grounds.  I was fortunate to be seated next to Wendy’s mother-in-law, Rene; she and her late husband Don had been so kind to me and Alice when my first marriage broke up.  I was so sorry to hear that she died just a few weeks ago.  I had been unable to take any photos at the wedding so was very pleased to receive a thank-you card from Jen and David which had photos from their wedding on it.  I have scanned it and chosen one of the photos but it hasn’t come out very well.

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This next gallery of photos is just a reminder of what we have to look forward to in the  spring!

Bluebell wood

Bluebell wood

Bluebell wood

I love bluebells (Hyacinthoides non-scripta) so I took a little detour on my way home from my mother’s house at the beginning of May so that I could see the flowers just outside the village of Withersdale Street.

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I have mentioned Pakenham Watermill before in my blog.  It is where we go to buy the best wholemeal flour which I use to make bread.

Pakenham Watermill

The rear of the building.  We visited on a perfect morning in May.

The mill with mill-pond

There are lots of House martin (Delichon urbica) nests under the eaves

Bird sculpture in the garden

The mill pond

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At about this time I visited Minsmere RSPB Reserve as I wanted to buy something from their shop.  While I was there I thought I would quickly walk through the woods to see what I could see.

Bluebells again!

Bluebells

Blue bluebells and white bluebells!

Common vetch (Vicia sativa)

Common stork’s-bill (Erodium cicutarium)

I don’t remember ever having seen this flower before despite it being ‘common’.  The seed-heads can be seen next to the flowers and their shape gives the plant it’s name.

Changing forget-me-not (Myosotis discolor)

The flowers are tiny and very difficult to photograph.  When they first open they are yellow but soon change to blue.  The plant especially likes to grow on sandy soil.

Shepherd’s-cress (Teesdalia nudicaulis)

This is another plant I don’t remember having noticed before, but that is not surprising because it is very low growing and not especially exciting to look at.  You can see a wood-ant (10 mm long) towards the bottom right of the photo which gives you some idea of the size of the flowers which are about 2 mm across – two of the four petals of the flower are longer than the other two.  The seeds are heart-shaped and a few can be seen at the top of the photo.  The leaves in the basal rosette are lobed and can also be seen at the top-centre.  Their shape reminds me of pasta servers.

Common sorrel (Rumex acetosa) creating red patches on the rising ground. Gorse (Ulex europaeus) can be seen flowering in the bushes on the sky-line.

Wavy bitter-cress (Cardamine flexuosa) – so-called because it’s stem is wavy rather than straight!

Rhododendron (Rhododendron ponticum)

Rhododendron has naturalised and become invasive in many places.  It is unwelcome as it reduces biodiversity and is very difficult to eradicate because it produces new shoots from its roots.  This link speaks more about the plant.

Bugloss (Anchusa arvensis)

This plant is very hairy and has interesting wavy-edged leaves.  The flowers are a lovely intense blue colour.

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Elinor wasn’t able to join her art and design group on their trip to London in April so a few weeks later Richard and I took her there ourselves.  We visited the Victoria and Albert Museum and Elinor chose to study the exhibits in the cast works gallery and the sculpture galleries.

Trajan’s column – lower

Trajan’s column – upper

Someone took a plaster-cast of the whole of Trajan’s column!  The column is 30 m / 98 ft tall (with the pedestal it is 35 m / 115 ft tall).  Its diameter is 37 m / 12.1 ft.  This cast is now invaluable to scholars because the original column has become very weathered and the figures cannot easily be studied.

I love this medieval carving from Germany! The details of the knight’s journey are exquisitely worked. There are trees, people and small creatures, buildings, a dragon and a princess to be rescued! It was difficult to get a decent photo because of the reflections off the glass case.  I also forgot to make a note of the artist and couldn’t find the piece when I went on the museum’s website.

‘A Bishop Saint’ by Sir Alfred Gilbert 1899.  This bishop’s gentle expression appealed to me very much.

‘The Virgin with the Laughing Child’ probably by Antonio Rossellino ca. 1465.  I could look at this statuette for ever! It is so intimate and loving! Look at the way the mother is holding her little boy on her knee with his leg between her forefinger and middle finger, her other hand on his tummy and his hand on hers.

After leaving the museum we decided to walk to Hyde Park and relax there for a short time before catching our train home.

The Royal Albert Hall – a beautiful building and an excellent concert hall

Opposite the Royal Albert Hall is the Albert Memorial

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That’s it for the time being!  I will leave you with my music choice, ‘This Is How It Feels’ by Inspiral Carpets, remembering Craig Gill (drums) who died on Tuesday 22 November 2016

Thanks for visiting!

Norwich – Sir Thomas Browne

Tags

Anne and Patrick Poirer, art, Norfolk, Norwich, polymath, sculpture, Sir Thomas Browne, street furniture

As the weather hasn’t been conducive to photography recently, I decided to find and use some more of the pictures I have taken over the past year on my walks through Norwich.

Next to the Guildhall (mentioned in my recent Norwich post) is Norwich Market and on the further side of the Market Place is Hay Hill.

Statue of Sir Thomas Browne

Sir Thomas Browne, born 19th October 1605 in London, lived and worked in Norwich from 1636 until his death on 19th October 1682.  He was a polymath; a physician, a botanist and a writer.  He was well-educated, well-travelled, religious and very well-liked and respected in his time.  He wrote several important books and in doing so, coined many new words in the English language.

ambidextrous, antediluvian, analogous, approximate, ascetic, anomalous, carnivorous, coexistence, coma, compensate, computer, cryptography, cylindrical, disruption, ergotism, electricity, exhaustion, ferocious, follicle, generator, gymnastic, hallucination, herbaceous, holocaust, insecurity, indigenous, jocularity, literary, locomotion, medical, migrant, mucous, prairie, prostate, polarity, precocious, pubescent, therapeutic, suicide, ulterior, ultimate, veterinarian.

Sir Thomas Browne lived in the Hay Hill area nearly 400 years ago.  His house (which no longer stands) was in Orford Yard and he is buried in St Peter Mancroft church.  Both these places are next to Hay Hill.  He lived and worked slightly earlier in the same century as Samuel Pepys, who lived in London.

In 1671 King Charles II came to Norwich and viewed the city regiments from the balcony of the Guildhall.  Whilst he was in the city he knighted Thomas Browne and then dined with him on the first dolphin to be caught off the Norfolk coast.  This dolphin had been sent to Sir Thomas for his interest and dissection.

The statue of Sir Thomas Browne (see photo above) is by Henry Albert Pegram and it was commissioned to celebrate the 300th birthday of Sir Thomas.  The statue was unveiled on 19th October 1905 and huge crowds turned out to witness the ceremony. Pegram was also commissioned to make the memorial to Edith Cavell which stands outside the gate of Norwich Cathedral.

Edith Cavell Memorial

In the early years of this century the Hay Hill area of the city was looking a little run-down and untidy.  The authorities had wanted Anne and Patrick Poirer, a French husband and wife team of artists, to create a sculpture for the Marketplace when it was renovated but this hadn’t worked out.  They were therefore then asked to consider a commission for a sculpture on Hay Hill.  The couple researched the area and decided on a homage to Sir Thomas Browne.  This was a major public art commission, paid for by The Arts Council England East and Norwich City Council with a contribution from Norfolk County Council.  It was commissioned in 2005 and installed and opened officially in 2007.  The work was intended to be a set of street furniture; a living room for the city.

Homage to Sir Thomas Browne – street furniture

The sculpture was made in Pietrasanta in the foothills of the Carrara mountains in Tuscany, Italy.  This area is famous for it’s beautiful white marble; the granite used in this sculpture came from Zimbabwe.  (We visited Pietrasanta a couple of years ago while on holiday and enjoyed the best pizza and bruschetta we have ever tasted in a little café in the market place.)

There are twenty pieces of sculpture and twenty-two lights and all the pieces relate in some way to Sir Thomas.  Some of the pieces are made of marble and some of granite.  Some are polished and shiny and some are rough and matt.  All are intended to be sat upon.

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These pieces are arranged in a pattern known as a quinconce or quincunx, a five-pointed diamond shape which Sir Thomas believed existed throughout nature.  The pieces are also arranged in line with his home in Orford Yard and the place of his burial in St Peter Mancroft church.  Many of these pieces are inscribed with quotes from Sir Thomas using the original spelling.  At night the sculptures are lit with coloured lights set in the ground and which are part of the art-work.

The largest pieces are a marble brain and an eye carved in the classical style and refer to Sir Thomas as a thinker and to his approach to philosophy, religion and science.  There are five granite chairs,  two benches, three tables, six conical seats and two smaller pod seats which represent Sir Thomas’ interest in Botany.  The gold design on the back of some of the seats is the artists’ interpretation of the rooms of the brain – memory, creativity and intellect and the way they are linked together.

This area is well-used and in the summer many people sit here and eat their lunch or rest after doing their shopping.  Sadly, not many people understand its relevance or know who Sir Thomas Browne was!

Thanks for visiting!