The Celtic Muse

Touring the Cotswolds

2008-07-04T15:46:00.000-07:00

I'm not long returned from a brief 4 day holiday staying in Gloucester but driving round the general area exploring. Day 1 - Sunday - was spent travelling. I'd sort of planned to stop off at Wightwick Manor, just outside Wolverhampton. The manor is an Arts and Crafts National Trust property, however the weather was so bad I kept going to Gloucester. Once in Gloucester, I managed to have a quick look round the cathedral just as it was closing. A choir had just started practising and their sound was out of this world.
Monday morning I was up early and surprised myself by navigating my way round the country roads to Hidcote Manor Garden. This garden is designed in Arts and Crafts style. This concept was somewhat lost on me - I just did not get it. It was a beautiful garden, well kept and designed but someone really needed to explain why it is in Arts and Crafts style. Following on from Hidcote I made my way to another NT property nearby called Upton House. This property was full of Hogarth and other artists and was rather like an Art Gallery. I didn't spend long there and later found myself in Stow on the Wold where I had a very nice dinner.
Tuesday I planned to go to Lacock Abbey in the morning, this also has a Photographic museum but the Abbey was closed so I went onto Dyrham Park which is a normal country estate owned by the Trust. The extra time was take up with a visit to Avebury. I must say, if you ever are in the Avebury area, visit it, its fascinating, and an awful lot more than a mysterious stone circle, there are several other sites connected to Avebury that are musts to see.
Wednesday was my last full day in the area and I'd planned to go to 2 properties in Buckinghamshire, but was shocked when I looked at how far they were from Gloucester. So the morning was spent at Hailes Abbey with a very good Audio tour, I then went in search of Snowshill Manor at which point the heavens opened. If your into mad eccentric collectors, or conscious of not having a perfectly tidy home then go to Snowshill. Its full of what to me is junk but to Charles Wade must have been valuable treasure. After Snowshill I found my way to the village of Broadway, had a very nice cream tea, and then later on explored Bourton on the Water, the Venice of the Cotswolds.
The jewel in the crown was visiting Wightwick Manor on my way home on Thursday. It was an unforgettable experience and for me a perfect example of a NT property at its best. The house was owned, redesigned, rebuilt, furnished by the Mander family. William Morris & Co were engaged in providing soft furnishings, tiles, glasswork, wall coverings, William de Morgan provided lustre ware, tiling, Kemp provided stained glass. The ceilings, wall friezes, and garden design could be taken straight out of pre Raphaelite paintings, and indeed everywhere you turned you were within inches of pre Raphaelite art whether it be on a piece of furniture or in a picture frame. If you are at all interested in the Arts and Crafts movement or in the pre Raphaelites this place is a must see. Also, they go to town at Christmas decorating it, and that is something I'm looking forward to.

I'm back

2008-06-13T12:02:00.001-07:00

After a while away from here - I've come back to give an update. I'm still volunteering at 59 Rodney Street and we have a much improved interest in the property. One Sunday saw us manage 55 people through the building. That may not sound like a lot, however its a very small property, and we can only manage 2 tours an hour between 11 and 4.
Liverpool is Capital of culture 2008 so there's loads of arty things going on that I can hopefully share on here.
I'm particularly looking forward to the opening of the Victoria Buildings as a new Art Gallery and Museum for the Sir John Moores University.
Lifewise I've been on a bit of a rollercoaster, which sounds dramatic but its not. I've had quite an eye opening time since I last blogged, and time has been taken up with a lot of self-development. One positive outcome is I'm moving forward with things that I was finding very hard to initiate.
TTFN - see you soon

Peter Haggerty and an update

2007-06-20T14:19:00.000-07:00

Wednesday 20th June 2007 - Peter Haggerty

After work, I had a special date at '59 Rodney Street'. Dr Peter Haggerty was giving a talk for the National Trust volunteers. His talk covered how Peter met ECH and how , with the help of some other people, he managed to persuade ECH to set up a trust to carry on conserving the collection once he died. Thankfully, this resulted in saving the massive collection of photographs from probable destruction.

What is clear is that the National Trust does a fantastic job of maintaining the collection and presenting the studio and dwelling as a time capsule to the public, with the ECH Trust presiding in the background. The building , a veritable Georgian town house / mansion, occupies 5 floors. As regards the art work, there are 140K photographs, of which only 1400 have been digitally stored in the Trusts Photographic library so there is still a lot of work to be done. These are the flat facts of the matter.... what Peter's talk conveyed is the passion people still feel for the artist that is Chambre Hardman, and the tragedy that would have been if his work had not been preserved for public consumption.
I would love to have posted a picture of Peter here but sadly can't find one.
As regards an update, I've currently got a shocking cold and just completed a first aid course, am wanting to find a new job and have not had much time for blogging. Hopefully there will be more news soon.....

What a week

2007-06-17T09:16:00.000-07:00

Firstly, apologies to people who have kindly left me comments. I am getting round now to catching up with my blogging. I'm afraid I've had a very busy week.
For what seems like most of the week, but it was only 3 days, I was undertaking a very intensive course, with an exam at the end of it - the ISEB Foundation in Software Testing Certificate. So if I pass the exam I will be certified. The reason it seemed so long was the amount of work we had to do for it. Anyway, I'm sure it will all be worth it.
As regards the rest of the week, I've been trying to recover from the exhaustion brought about by the loss of sleep resulting from all the late night - into the morning - reading I've been doing. So blogging was not high on the agenda.
However.... I now have a smashing new Sony Ericsson camera phone with cyber shot technology built into it. So I can take photos with my camera and use them in my blog. I was going to buy a digital camera, a cyber shot, but this has saved me the bother. I've now got to get to grips with it.
As regards my pc and other stuff, pc still needs its cd rom fixing, but I've added the USB extension hub and that's all working very nicely. I did get to the gym last week - only once, but I did have 2 yoga classes and a cold and the course revision and homework so the odds were against me. A smashing bit of news was that one of my mates gave birth to a baby boy.

This week, I need to sort out my house insurance, car insurance and book my car in for its first service, plus go to the gym, have one yoga class, and try and see another of my mates who is back from working in the Far East. Here is piccie of my car, taken with my old phone

Today sees me at '59 Rodney Street' so you may read more soon on the property, however I think my next challenge is to publish a photo on here taken with my new camera phone. Watch this space!!!

Where have I been ?

2007-06-04T23:23:00.000-07:00

Sunday saw me volunteering at '59 Rodney Street' - we had a very quiet day with only 8 people visiting - 3 tours. There are several things that delight me about the place and they are:
- the other volunteers are so nice to talk to, we have a good laugh about all sorts;
- everytime I go back I learn something new about the photographs, or photography, or the business, or the Hardmans, or their subjects.

The Chambre Hardman photograph you see for today's blog is "A Memory of Avignon". Everyone asks who the people are in the picture, and I found out on Sunday that they are friends of the actress Beryl Bainbridge who was photographed by the Hardmans. To see more of Hardman's pictures, access the National Trust Photographic Library at www.ntpl.org.uk. As time goes on I will muse more about Chambre Hardman as he just does not get enough press.

So what happened following my blogging on Saturday night ?

Well not content with being a novice at this blogging malarkey. There was I deftly unplugging the wires from the back of my base unit, and little did I know I was in the process of destroying one of my USB ports. Don't ask how I managed it ! Fortunately I have an extra one I can use but its off to the shops to get an extension for it methinks.

What made it all so very satisfying and worthwhile was the fact that I failed to do what I'd originally planned which was replace the cd-rom - the reason - I couldn't figure out how to open the base unit.

Its dead easy apparently - there's a lever !

Well I'm jiggling the damn 'lever' as I blog and ITS DOING NOWT !!!

Maybe its cos its Monday !

Sudley

2007-06-02T19:20:00.000-07:00

At last Sudley Art Gallery is opened following its restoration. It looked much the same as it was 3 years ago when I last visited, but there were improvements as well and it was lovely to see it busy with people.

The house was lived in by the Holt family, who were largely philanthropists. George Holt earned his money and became rich as a shipping merchant, and believed that people such as themselves should use their wealth to enrich and make easier the lives of those less fortunate. This tradition was carried on by his daughter Emma. Emma ran charitable enterprises from the estate and bequethed both house and its collection of paintings to the City of Liverpool when she died in 1944.

What is fabulous about this house is the fact you are wandering round what is effectively a property furnished much as it was when the Holt family lived there. The painting collection is fantastic, and strongly favours British artists of Holt's time. I've selected a couple of my pre Raphaelite favourites, however, this is just a very small sample of what you will find there:

'Landscape - Hampstead'

by Sir John Everett Millais

'The Finding of the Saviour in the Temple'

by William Holman Hunt

'Angel Playing a Flageolet'

by Edward Burne-Jones

As regards the rest of my life today, restarted back at the gym - watch this space - don't want to get too ambitious and cocky just yet, and got some pc maintenance to do, which I may do tonight or I may not, so hopefully if I do , I'll be back blogging on here soon.

Tomorrow sees me back National Trust volunteering at '59 Hope Street' The Photographic Studio of Edward Chambre Hardman which I'll tell you about some time. And slowly I'm gathering ideas about the peripherals I want to add to my blog.

Under Construction - Part I

2007-06-01T13:21:00.000-07:00

This is my first posting in my first weblog - and it feels weird.
I followed the instructions and am adopting the attitude that the best approach is to create a weblog and worry about everything else later.
So what about my comment title - well its part 1 of Under Construction because
a) I intend to enhance my blog as I go along, and
b) in general my life is going through a re construction at the moment - change is ever afoot - procrastination and apathy must be crushed - so perhaps blogging on here will help me focus my energies on what is important at the time.
The blog name is the only thing that has actually been thought about, and checked out on the internet, as I didn't want to snaffle the title from somewhere else.
There is a music group in the 'States called "Celtic Muse", hence my use of 'The' to differentiate.
'Celtic' is accounted for by the fact I am Scottish,and the 'Muse' bit, well...
I do love all things artistic especially pre Raphaelite and symbolist art, all sorts of music from Renaissance to present day, ballet, drama, literature, architecture and history, so don't be surprised if you venture upon my blog and find me 'musing' away to myself on something I've seen, read or been thinking about.
I'm also passionate about our heritage and recently started volunteering for the National Trust. Historically I've been a member of the 'Trust' and English Heritage for over 10 years, and been round loads of their locations, up and down the country, particularly those found in Lancashire, Yorkshire, Merseyside and Wales.
As regards travel, wherever I go, I need culture to keep my head occupied, which explains why I've been to a succession of cities with fabulous art galleries. The most frequented and much loved is Paris, but I'm also a fan of Rome, Venice, and not so long ago visited for the first time London and... wait for it... Birmingham which has a good pre Raphaelite collection.
So here endeth my first blog that is hopefully the tip of the blogberg!