TAKING STOCK

There is often a moment in older age, pottering through your usual routine, which pulls you up short and makes you think beyond the banalities of the Brexit debate or of Meghan’s latest outfit. I had just such a moment 2 weeks ago as I had the melancholy duty to attend the funeral in Aberdeen of a much-loved sister-in-law – the attendance of several hundred friends testified to a busy life embracing different circles and to her popular personality, in part softening the blow to my bereft brother.

The emotions one feels are largely positive. Love and gratitude predominate while happy memories take precedence, humorous events and moments are fondly recalled. There is necessarily a rueful acknowledgement of the inevitability of mortality but this is overcome by a sea of friendly, sometimes half-forgotten, faces, placing a mourned life in a warmly esteemed context.

The city of Aberdeen

Our return train journey from Folkestone via King’s Cross, London to Aberdeen took us most of the length of our beloved country. The stretch from London to York was taken at high speed and Grantham’s high parish church tower (at the sight of which Ruskin swooned) was followed by gigantic York Minster, hugely impressive Norman Durham Cathedral, the historic walls of Berwick-on-Tweed and on to Edinburgh affording glimpses of the Castle and the Royal Mile. The train trundles on slowly passing the majestic Forth estuary with its three huge bridges (I walked over the first road bridge before it opened to traffic in 1964). We soon see busy Dundee incomparably sited by the wide river Tay (I sailed there with a close Dundee friend in the 1960s) spanned by more long bridges. Then we were on very familiar ground as we passed Montrose (I went to church there every Sunday from my prep school in the early 1950s) then Stonehaven (nearby ruined Dunnottar Castle is an unmissable sight) and finally to my splendid home town of Aberdeen. I had not lived there since 1968 and my recent visits have been fitful but what memories this journey evoked!

The iconic Forth Bridges

Memories are certainly what I thrive upon and I can blot out the disagreeable ones and cherish the happy ones. Yet I am not so old that all I do is wallow in an unbalanced nostalgia. I still have some years left in my armoury and want to make them count. Family unity and the fulfilment of individuals within it are priorities, public life needs to be followed and causes campaigned for. Although it is getting harder, new contacts and hopefully new friends need to be made and participations embarked upon. We do not need to stand alone, we are all members of a local community.

Plenty of honoured grey-beards show us the way. Norman Tebbit (87) is a doughty controversialist of the Thatcherite Tory school while Michael Heseltine (85) is the last-surviving Tory “wet” and loquacious to boot. More admirable perhaps is Judy Dench (84) still delighting audiences on stage and screen or charming naturalist David Attenborough (92), not to mention ultra-dedicated Her Majesty the Queen (92). No excuse for slacking!

Old people are not naturally crotchety or negative. My much-missed sister-in-law never had a harsh word for anybody and we can follow her example. The old like to reach out and help the young in peace and contentment. We would do well to moderate our language and stop accusations of betrayal, conspiracy or malevolence. Most opinions are honestly held and debate should be polite, civil and thoughtful. The old strive for harmony among all mankind, as the poet said:

 ” That man to man the world o’er shall brithers be, for a’ that.”

SMD

26.2.19  

Text copyright© Sidney Donald 2019

SOME WONDERS IN WOOD

Since time immemorial Man has been fashioning wood into artistic objects. The achievements of Native American, Chinese, Hindu and Islamic woodworkers have been immense, and despite rot, damp, drought and fire, many examples have survived. In this huge field I wanted to highlight examples I have seen or with which I make a connection. Wooden artefacts bring such simple and accessible pleasure.

In Greece most Orthodox churches have an iconostasis or reredos, a decorative screen behind the altar containing cherished icons. A particularly fine one in golden gilded wood was to be seen in Agia Matronna, Karlovasi on our beloved island of Samos, following a widely adopted Byzantine tradition.

Iconostasis at Basilica of the Nativity, Bethlehem

The Gothic age in Europe brought prominence to master wood-carvers and one of the most famous was the German Tilman Riemenschneider (1460-1531).

Altar of the Holy Blood, Rothenburg ob den Tauber

        

This altar is in the Lutheran St Jakob’s church in Rothenburg, the enchanting Franconian town kept in the 17^th century style, our favourite stopover in South Germany.

Viet Stoss Altar, St Mary's, Krakow, Poland

The other German master was Viet Stoss whose fine altar in Krakow is a national treasure. But the Renaissance insinuated itself and ecclesiastic patronage gave way to the secular.

The name to conjure with for late Stuart and early Hanoverian monarchs and aristocrats was Anglo-Dutch Grinling Gibbons (1648-1721). He could sculpt of course in stone and his swags adorn the walls of St Paul’s Cathedral in London and in some City of London churches. His pièce de résistance is his wood carving at Petworth House, executed for the Earl of Egremont.

Grinling Gibbons, The Carved Room at Petworth

Grinling Gibbons’ expertise was widely admired and his smaller carvings gave much pleasure.

Limewood panel of Musical Instruments by Grinling Gibbons

                             

A specifically English innovation was the art of wood engraving where an artist carves his image onto the dense end-grain of a block of wood, inks it and applies modest pressure to print his picture. The pioneer of this technique was Thomas Bewick (1753-1826) who produced his monumental History of British Birds (1797 – 1804) containing bird pictures and “tail pieces” depicting rustic scenes.

The Sparrow-Hawk by Bewick

Bewick's tail-piece Shooting from a Hide

This wood-engraving technique was used for the striking illustrations by Gustave Doré of Don Quixote in 1863 and Gibbons’ wood-carving genius was emulated by the Victorian William Gibbs Rogers, whose splendid decoration of St Mary-at-Hill, Lovat Lane in the City I much enjoyed (guided by Betjeman), staircases, swags, pews and pulpit, though most was sadly destroyed by a fire in 1988.

In the 20^th century many English artists worked in wood notably Clifford Webb, Eric Gill and John and Paul Nash. We were flattered by the American modernist and abstract artist, Louise Nevelson, of Russian extraction, who presented in 1964, her An American Tribute to the British People in sumptuous gold-coloured wood;

An American Tribute to the British People by Louise Nevelson

Such a generous tribute is a rarity these days!

SMD

8.02.19

Text Copyright© Sidney Donald 2019