The course tutor was
Jessie Chorley. She showed us a number of pieces of her work. I liked the way she was interested in telling stories in her pieces, (such as
these embroidered story books) the way she used discarded and weathered ephemera and fabric in new ways, but fully appreciating their qualities, and the way she took time over her work, for example in the hand stitched writing she uses. Her work also had a lovely imperfect feel to it, reflecting the weathered feel of the materials she uses. I had no idea what I would do beforehand, and my book came about from lucky circumstances-namely that Clare gave me a page of an old French dictionary with insects on, I had a postcard of a Dutch Interior, and my book was called 'Below Scafell'
Jessie's books had the magical feel of a dolls house (look
here for some examples of tiny interiors and other lovely stuff)-tiny mysterious interiors with little clocks and chairs, surrounded by theatrical pink silk curtains, hidden inside the cover of a book.
My book is called ''Below the Floor". ( I wanted to incorporate parts of the book itself, rather than obliterate it and Below played a big part in giving me an idea!)
The story that the book may show is not a happy one necessarily. An ordinary family is shocked to discover the secrets that lie below the floor. As they go deeper down, the cellars reveal more and more tiny horrors. The story might be a happier one than that. One of the family, perhaps the son, is a budding zoologist, and uses the inhabitants of the house as research material, observing their habits and relationships. There could also be a bit of Indiana Jones activity-the hero or heroine has to battle fearsome creatures to get to the treasure!
I am looking at it from a very human point of view, and I know that in my mind the story is more the first scenario than the others! The story may be a story of cruelty and misunderstanding, told from the insects' point of view. I know how much ''James and the Giant Peach'' helped me in my efforts to empathise with spiders.
The fly in the photos was most obliging, and sat to have his close up done! Aren't his eyes amazing?
The little pieces of text on the inside cover are things that leapt out at me as I was cutting my book-they all relate to my feelings about creepy crawlies I think, apart from the colour one and the one about chemicals-but I was thinking of mutations here! The colour one is just nice!
They are part of a strange insect tree growing out of the cellar.
A Blatte is a cockroach I now realise, after looking at
this (scary!) site about the creatures that share our homes!
When I showed Andy the fly photo, he started to sing this song-I can't find the song to play you but here are the
lyrics.
...it is three days into a new month before I notice. Being in the garden reminds me of the seasons passing with the beauty of dried seed heads.
...I do things in photoshop without knowing how I did them, but like the result anyway.
...beautiful seedheads look like...
...tiny monsters-on closer inspection.
...things out there remind me of fairy stories. Today I was the prince, hacking through the forest of evil ivy, to rescue the fair maiden the fence.
...tiny bugs have great names-this little, nearly camouflaged shield bug was one of many creatures I saw today-including a huge dragonfly. It flew over the garden quite high up, then away over the roof of the house. 
