A Favourite Painting - Matilda's Trees

 

Trying to choose a favourite painting, like a favourite book or piece of music is so hard it is almost impossible. I like the work of lots of artists. Yesterday, travelling home from an adventure, the journey, thanks to the sat nav, took us over the Pennines and through Mottram in Longendale where the artist,  L.S.Lowry used to live. I love all of his work. I remember feeling quite emotional when I saw his paintings for the first time. This was in Salford, long before the gallery bearing his name was built.  His painting ‘Going to the Match’ was in the news last year when it was purchased and saved for the Lowry collection. Going to the match is what I plan to be doing later, so the painting might have been a good choice, but instead,  I’ve picked ‘The Cripples’.

Lowry painted ‘The Cripples’ in 1949. It’s one of my favourites of his work. I have a print and a fridge magnet and it always makes me smile. I’m slightly worried that my admission to being amused by it makes me a bad person. I am amused by Lowry’s humour in the painting. I’m not mocking the subjects.  Apparently, there’s controversy about the content and the title and I’m a bit shocked about that. I’ve got disability issues, so does my husband. The painting isn’t about us or anyone else. Cripple is not a term in use these days when we refer to people with disabilities but I’m not sure if it should be considered offensive.  I feel sure that Lowry didn’t paint anything with the purpose of upsetting anyone. As a Christian should I be upset by paintings of Christ’s crucifixion reminding me of His suffering? I will admire the work of the artist.

Steven Robert Bruce is a local artist who has produced excellent paintings. He has a website showing a collection of his work. One of my favourites is his painting of Ian Holloway celebrating Blackpool FC’s victory at Wembley, going into the Premier League. I don’t know where the actual painting is. I wish it was at the stadium.

My favourite painting of this week – it might be replaced before weekend if we’re looking after her – is the latest work of art by our youngest grandchild, four year old Matilda.  She was painting, freestyle, and created a fabulous tree scene from her own imagination. I’m amazed and enchanted as I often am by my grandchildren.

My poem, from the archives,

Salford

Industrial landscapes
Where nobody escapes
From human desolation.
Salford, grey and worn-out
Drab people hang about
Seeking some consolation,
Painted as matchstick men
Back in the decades when
Lowry found inspiration.

Shelagh’s taste of honey,
Tony Wilson’s money
Invested in the city.
High-rise in Broughton Park
Poems of Cooper-Clarke
So sharp and smart and witty.
A gentle, summer breeze
Wafts around Salford Quays
Modern style simplicity.

Pamela Winning 2015

Thanks for reading, Pam x

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The Ritual.

For reasons unknown, the theme this week is Ghost Stories. Well, it is coming up to the end of October- ghouls are a big thing this season and vampires are just so, whatever. Honestly, if I hear another schoolgirl swooning over bloody Cedric Diggory (whom is still dead, by the way... Vampire my arse.) I'll probably lose it.

This being a 'poetry blog' though, I decided to go with my newly refreshed enthusiasm (thanks, Lancaster LitFest) and write something new. Trawling the mind for childhood memories- the ones I feel are always the scariest, the one moment of fear I remember most from those days is quite clear still- waking up to catch children being dragged through a door on TV (I believe, Poltergeist). I was sleeping out, away from home at a friend's house over the way.

I was quite surprised it was a different story that came from within me then. I spent a lot of years in the Scouts as a kid, learnt a lot about myself in the process but, like all the other kids, was only really there for the holidays. A few mates, some tents and several liberated miniature spirit bottles did me for a weekend just nicely, thank you very much. Some of the memories, it seems, weren't quite as jolly. I hope you enjoy the poem.

The Ritual

Trudging with socks sodden from the track

we smelt the air- caught ear of crackling wood over

bleating sheep and rushed towards flickering light.

It was there, with Pendle Hill still fresh in mind

you showed your stripes- pulled rank and asked,

Do you believe in ghost stories.

Our legs trembled below fire flushed faces

as marshmallows bloomed and dripped their mess

into the spitting hearth. You snapped.

On the tops things change- new variables

with every breath of the wind. You must obey.

Do as you are told, pull together.

That was the night he danced.

Took to the pole for tuck shop

twenty-ps he gathered, cap in hand.

And boy, did he dance. Shed his shell

crab like as he scuttled fleshy and nude-

woggle half covering his pubescent penis.

We soon saw his face- caught it in the torch

as you hoisted damp pants up the flagpole.

I'd never seen a ghost before-

and we just sat there, trembling.

Thanks for reading, S.

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Roald Dahl: Slutty Cinderellas, Ugly Twits, Filthy Little Maggots and a Splattering of Controversy

Last week, on the 13^th September, it was Roald Dahl Day. I, along with many other Twitter users, was slightly surprised and aggravated by the lack of a Google Doodle to mark the occasion. It irritated me because – from my perspective, at least – it seemed like a fairly simple task to undertake. Roald Dahl left behind his imagination: vivid descriptions, brilliant neologisms and characters that remain with us long after we’ve closed the book – not to mention the perfectly apt illustrations of Quentin Blake. Yet Google said, NO! And as a consequence, the geeky part of my persona was left disappointed.

Yes, Google did honour Dahl in 2007 with a Doodle (which can be found here) to mark what would have been the author’s 91^st birthday. However, this year – which marked both his 95^th birthday and 50 years since the publication of James and the Giant Peach – there was nothing more than the ever-so-familiar Google logo.

It was also last week (and on the same day) that Dahl’s Granddaughter, Sophie Dahl, featured on the Today Programme and spoke about the £500,000 needed to preserve / move Roald Dahl’s writing shed. The appeal caused uproar among Radio 4 listeners, and quickly spread to Twitter where one annoyed tweeter wrote: “Have I got this wrong? The international model and TV star Sophie Dahl is asking us for money to restore a shed.” Even Times columnist Janice Turner felt she needed to throw in her shrapnel bit (and a few typos), writing: “Roald Dahl’s shed needs £250K to be renovated. Sophie Dahl could earn that on a single advertising modelling job., the Big Stingy Giant.”

I, however, did not find myself bitter or angry. I realise that we are in difficult economic times. I – like many others – have undergraduate debts. I have a cleaning job to cover living expenses and MA fees. But, if the Roald Dahl Museum and Story Centre wanted a donation from myself, I would gladly give what I could afford. Because to me, culture and heritage have a great importance; they’re the things that cannot be replaced once you’ve lost them. You can’t find them on Amazon or inside the mammoth Argos catalogue, because their worth derives, in part, from their singularity. Dahl’s shed is how he left it: the wastepaper bin has not been emptied, his last Marlboro rests on the edge of a full ashtray, letters and photographs still adorn the polystyrene tiled walls (complete with nicotine stains). And to lose a piece of literary history, such as this, would be like erasing the Ommpa Loompas from Charlie and the Chocolate Factory, or replacing Matilda’s love of literature with a PS3. Unthinkable, mindboggling, unimaginable, absurd, inconceivable and unbelievable.

As you are probably aware, Dahl’s work – rather than the preservation of his writing shed - also received much criticism. The portrayal of adults, his use of language, and themes that have been classified as anti-authoritarian, anti-sentimental, misogynistic and racist have caused great debate amongst literary critics, parents, teachers, librarians. Two of his books, at one time or another, were even seen as so “dangerous” that they were banned in parts of America. But children kept reading, and continued to be fascinated by Dahl’s imagination.

I won’t go into a discussion about censorship within children’s literature (a blog post does not afford me the space), but I will say this: I stumbled across a copy of Matilda in the local library when I was 6 years old. I read the first two chapters before I left the library. I finished the book before going to sleep that night. I continued to read Roald Dahl’s books throughout my childhood. And, as far as I can see, they did me no harm – other than equipping me with a love of literature (which can be expensive).

So, even after his death, it would seem that Dahl cannot escape controversy – his writing (or his shed) will continue to divide and prompt debate.

Thank you for reading,
Lar

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