A Patch Work

Well, London is claiming me back with all its charms…Jeremiah, as usual, is keeping me entertained with events at Europe House   ( https://www.facebook.com/12StarGallery/,) above and below with Nick Sargent.

 and last night I went to the Chelsea Arts Club and had lovely dinner and lots of drinks with old friends and Mali veterans Lucy and Andrew- the latter took me to the Almeida for a great play on Wednesday  called Against- and  at the same time I am  in daily touch with Timbuktu , Bamako  and Djenné.

The factions that have been working against the Manuscript Library in Djenné have had a final go at trying to close us down, claiming that we are working illegaly. They wanted to see proof that the projects in Djenné had had Malian government approval and cooperation at the outset which it did of course.  I was able to contact London  who managed to find, in the archives, the first project with its signatures and stamps from the representative of the Mission Culturelle in Djenné : that is the local representative of the Ministry ot Culture. That has not stopped the agitators, who are determined to cause us some harm. And all, I suspect, because they  have not earned any money from the project themselves. 

And in Timbuktu the staff have all returned safely and are now waiting for Suleyman, the instructor to arrive from Bamako to set up all the material so the team can finally start working.

 But all that seems a long way away when I sit here, painting my  suggestions for the floorcloth in Auckland Castle.

                                                                         

And now Sunday lunch is cooking slowly in the oven while I go to mass at St Francis, Pottery Lane. Soon old friends Yonatani, Claire and Geoff will be joining me for roast Lamb and mint sauce.  My world seems a patchwork quilt of many  disparate elements, both ordinary and extraordinary, that somehow all work together to make a whole…

Ladbroke Grove

Overlooking once more the familiar sky line from my flat in London where  I have just moved in again.  After eleven years with only sporadic and short visits back here, between tenants, I am now officially a Ladbroke Grove Resident again. When I bought this flat back in 2002, I had two flats to chose between, equally good. I chose this one because of Van Morrison and his lovely song Slim Slow Slider from Astral Weeks.  (Yes, I am that silly)....... :

‘ Saw you walking down by the Ladbroke Grove this morning…saw you early this morning, with your brand new boy and your Cadillac’.

I have not regretted my whimsical choice. I love my  little flat, and it has always seemed romantic to me, to live on Ladbroke Grove…

And tomorrow I‘m picking up on something else from my old pre-Mali life : I am travelling up to Bishop Auckland, by Darlington in Northern England, where I will visit Auckland Castle, and perhaps begin a commission to recreate a historical painted floorcovering  called a floorcloth, or oilcloth, an ancestor to linoleum and a little known part of design history in which I would be able to  claim to be a world expert, if it didn’t sound so pretentious. Oh, what the hell : I AM an expert. I  spent two years researching this  at the Royal College of Art, History of Design Department and ended up writing a thesis that gained me an M.Phil. But in the last few years I have not made any of these recreations, since I have been ensconced in deepest Mali. So let’s see what happens…

 A couple of days later.

Castle Auckland has been the seat of the bishops of Durham for almost a thousand years, until 2010, when the Church of England decided to sell it. It is now owned by  the Auckland Castle Trust and is being restored to be opened to the public in May 2018. I am standing in the dining room where in the late eighteenth century the architect James Wyatt was commissioned by the then incumbent,  Bishop Barrington,  to put in the neo-gothic window behind me, amongst other improvements. At that time the inventory tells us that an 'oil cloth' was added to the room. That is where I now come in to the equation. This 'oil cloth' would most probably have been painted to imitate an oriental carpet, or a 'Turkey Carpet' as it was called.There is no mention of a pattern, but we can assume that it was fairly elaborate in such a grand room, the walls of which houses twelve Zurbaran paintings depicting Jacob and his twelve sons. I will now revisit my old haunts and do some research at the V&A in the National Arts Library for suitable patterns. How nice!

Below Wyatt' s drawing for the Dining room.

Meanwhile, back in Mali, the little Timbuktu crew is continuing the digitization training in Bamako…here are some first pictures :

 Youssouf Traoré, to the left, is going to work on the meta data which accompanies the images. He is fluent in Arabic, French and English.  We have a very good crew for Timbuktu. they will be heading home next week, to begin, finally the work which was delayed by the terrorist attack in August.

KarKar...

Ah, Kar Kar!
Or Boubakar Traoré, the Master of elegant simplicity. Noone can make such heartbreaking lyrics and chords with more economy  and depth. Not even Dylan. I just listened to Dylan and Johnny Cash on You Tube singing

If you're travelin' in the north country fair
Where the winds hit heavy on the borderline
Remember me to one who lives there
She once was a true love of mine

how marvellous.

and KarKar only needs to sing:

I Taara Santa Maryia, I ka Mai fo N’ye…If you go to Santa Maria, be sure to greet Mai for me..(in my dodgy Bambara translation.)

to convey the same thing...

And with such minimal means Kar Kar

makes me cry, and I am not the only one...