Monday, June 25, 2012

Kettle's Yard: book spines and other patterns


Last but one Kettle's Yard post, I think.







Pod patterns.



  


I wonder if olden times potteries paid people to make up touching verses for their transfers?




The Ben Nicholson hand-printed textile Clive said to look out for.



12 comments:

herhimnbryn said...

Image 4. Gum nut pods. I walk over them every day. How wonderful to see them in a house in the UK!

Thanks for these posts Lucy, am enjoying them so much.

Zhoen said...

Reminds me a bit of the Isabella Gardner Museum of Boston. Personal, idiosyncratic, utterly eccentric and tasteful. In short, a delight.

christopher said...

You have such a loving eye, my friend. Thank you.

Unknown said...

Those books look like old friends of each other and in some case I can easily see of mine.

Clive Hicks-Jenkins said...

Ah ha. I'd mis-remembered the Ben Nicholson textile as having a typographic theme, but that was probably just me being steeped in the Alphabet Primer I was working on when I wrote to you. Lovely bold pattern nonetheless, made probably with a lino-block. Which is all a reminder to me to get on with my own textile design!

marly youmans said...

No wonder Clive told you not to miss it--as bold as his own!

Evidently the verse was much used: http://www.unitedcollections.net/london-sunderlandtynemouth.html

It seems like the sort of thing young ladies wrote in autograph albums with beautiful script...

Still crave the Windsors... and the bentwood seat chair is nice too.

zephyr said...

What a wonderful collection of images. i really like how you've cropped things.

marja-leena said...

The Ben Nicholson hand-printed textile is stunning, and looks quite Clive-ish too! I love the old books, in fact they remind me of our loved, old but shabby ones relegated to a downstairs room. Thanks again, Lucy, for sharing your travel photos once again!

Lucy said...

Thanks all.

HHB - it's been nice to see you around, glad you're still on the circuit! Thanks for the id on the gum nut pods, I've the impression a lot of treasures were probably brought from all over the world.

Zhoen - house museums like this are an interesting idea, more inviting and satisfying in some ways that straight museum galleries, if they're done well. I started looking into others, the Scandinavians tended to be the forerunners.

Christopher - thanks for looking with me!

Plutarch - yes there are some familiar back views there. A lot about TE Lawrence I noticed...

Clive - glad you saw. That one was more reminiscent of your work, I thought, but there was another, which I thought I'd photographed but don't seem to have done; it was a smaller, simpler piece in a downstairs bathroom area, and it featured numbers, rather like those on a four sack or similar, no letters I don't think. Perhaps the two were slightly conflated in your memory. Funny how our minds do that, even those, like you, with a strong visual sense and recall...

Marly - thanks for researching the verse, I thought perhaps I should look it up! It's rather sweet though. I too love the Windsor chairs.

Zephyr - thanks, it really was an endless source of images ready made, a great pleasure.

ML - shabby old books are best, though it's nice to have new ones too. While high-end colour reproduction is better than it's ever been, ordinary printing is inferrior, I think; even the old Penguin pbs were better made to last than today's are, the paper didn't yellow so much and the bindings were stronger.

One more post to come on this, I think, with a few reflections. Kettle's Yard is very well known and well-photographed, but I've been gratified at how people have responded to these.

Lucas said...

I attended a poetry course in Kettles Yard about three years ago. These photographs recapture the complex livingspace yet art gallery perfectly. I think they do it much better than the ones on the Kettles Yard website.
I am just completing an art book making course at the City Lit in London. I wanted to ask if I could include the sonnet you wrote for LdP's competition in my art book. It would be one of the three that were submitted. So there would be yours, LdPs and mine. Is this OK with you?

Lucy said...

Lucas - That poetry course sounds wonderful, glad you like the pics.
Re the sonnet, yes, please, I'd be really honoured. Are you OK to find and take it off the blog, or would you like me to e-mail it to you? Leave your e-mail here, or e-mail me at lucy-dot-kempton-at-gmail-dot-com.

Roderick Robinson said...

Straight off I realised I'd read the first paperback on the left: Apsley Cherry-Gerrard's The Worst Journey In The World. It made my day; not a moment too soon, either, since it was 18.23 at the time.