ABCD October 2020

Artists Book Club Dove Zoomed on Saturday afternoon. Several members had taken part in Robin Frood’s three-hour Zoom mokuhanga workshop that morning – full marks to them for turning up in the afternoon as well!
It was a day to stay indoors, a day of endless rain. That’s been October, so far.

There was much excitement about the BBC TV series “The Secret History of Writing”. I’m looking forward to catching up on it with Jane this week.

Jane has discovered a blog on the British Library website about The Launderers, an arty group in 1920s London. Her grandmother, a playwright, was one of them. Below is a poster for one of her plays.

Judy has finished her cascading blizzard book of thirteen cantos, inspired by a new translation of Dante.

Janine is still making embroidered boxes.

Pauline has been foraging for ink-making materials.

Bron has been making Guelder-rose jelly, and taking part in a exhibition “A Crowded Room”

Carol was thrilled to find a rare moth, Clifden nonpareil, in her garden.
She has bought some wonderful papers from Cambridge Imprint, pattern-makers.

Inspired by Pat’s woven hedge, Caroline has woven an accordion book from her drawings and photos of the hedge she’s been studying. Coincidentally it echoes the colours in the photo above. Those are juvenile moorhens scampering along the bottom.

I (Ama) have completed the Australian Reverse Piano-hinge variation I showed last month, made from pages cut from a Gudrun Sjoden catalogue and coloured with wax crayons. It features birds and an obtrusive shape I see at night whether my eyes are open or closed; fortunately it does not interfere with my sight during the day. The book started as an exercise using waste paper. If I made it again I would make it differently!

Dates of next two Zoom meetings: 7 November and 5 December.

Finally, here are my collected and edited eavesdroppings

October Dove-droppings

the mouse is on the floor
so they started using vellum
it’s the dark ages again

a morning of mokuhanga
are you inky-fingered
the cats are taking over

I cleared the labyrinth
I don’t know what we’re doing
stuck in the centre

a gem from the past
they had amazing parties
it was against the law

the inevitable rainbow
a Lyrid and a fox
in a black blizzard

cut-throat competition
cantos cascading
I’ve recorded their bottoms

bats in the loft
or the Blue Underwing
bashing around with machinery

to see the sea
it’s the smell of the sea
it’s the sound it’s the rhythm

reflecting on the past
obsessed with moths
none of them finished of course

all this lovely paper
turned up in my moth-trap
not the newt

an experimental pillar
the cows have their turn
Dido and Aeneas in a hay-barn

a face appeared at a hole
it tastes like nothing else
hauling plates out of storage

squirrels in the roof
sloe gin in my cupboard
the most terrible quarrels

a cull of the poets
we are drowning
in the quagmire of online art

weathering it
feeling wintry
but Christmas isn’t happening