Tag Archives: artist residency

Toronto with Annie

Leaving behind The Last Voyage and Australia, I travel on to Canada reversing time, to connect with Annie’s Flight of the Meteor of 1872. The first place in Canada we cross paths is the furthest inland she reaches, Toronto and Niagara Falls.

Niagara Falls, Toronto, Louise Kenward 2014

Spending a couple of months without Annie as companion, Niagara is a great place to be reunited. I read and reread her journal entries, carefully placing my feet in the echoes of her prints. Descriptions seem brighter, Annie is younger, healthier, excited (as ever) by new discoveries. The Falls are impressive, they impress Annie despite having heard a great deal about them already.

Niagara Falls, Louise Kenward (2014)

One of the Canadian objects from the archives is this, an embroidered cigar case. Opening it up an inscription was found, identifying it as a gift.

Embroidered cigar case, Bexhill Museum (Louise Kenward, 2014)

Finding new inscription on cigar case.

Returning to Australia & the Northern Territories with Annie

Leave a reply

While I travelled in one direction, more or less, the journeys of Annie’s that I tracked were multiple. This meant that mid way through my journey, and just as I arrived in Australia, Annie died. It was not unexpected, I knew the date, time and place, but it was still met with sadness and some pause for reflection. It didn’t mean the end of Annie as travel companion, but from here on in I was travelling backwards through time, as far as Annie was concerned at least.

The last place the Sunbeam docked before Annie’s demise, was Darwin. This was the point of arrival for me in Australia, making my reaching this new world full of mixed feelings. Losing Annie here was a blow, she had, by that stage almost completed an entire loop around the country, and I had grown quite used to my virtual companion. I’d become quite attached, the process of travelling, of writing, had led me to find a strengthening connection.

Early morning, Darwin waterfront (Louise Kenward, 2014)

Arriving at dawn to a whole new world, in every sense, I experienced the ‘reverse culture shock’ often cited by travellers returning home after long journeys, adding to my sense of disorientation. I hadn’t expected to experience it mid way through, but after travelling through so many poorer parts of the world, adapting and establishing routines of one kind or another, to arrive in (an apparently) squeaky clean, shiny and empty Darwin took me by surprise. I had arrived after four months of crowded streets, bustling markets, squat toilets, mopeds piled with everything and anything (including the kitchen sink, entire families and livestock), it was noisy, colourful, chaotic. I loved it. Darwin was silent. Its wide pothole free tarmac streets empty. When a car did appear on the street it spotted me and stopped, allowed me to cross the road. I was dumbfounded. The best travel advice I have ever read is about crossing roads in Vietnam “just walk, keep walking, keep a steady pace and everything will drive around you” and that’s how it happens. I was well practised by now at crossing apparently impenetrable roads. For something to stop for me to cross, especially when there was nothing else on the roads, captured a whole sense of being somewhere else, somewhere new, somewhere surreal and unexpected. It was unsettling. I walked to the waterfront. The sea is a constant. It soothes. The only people I saw at 6am were joggers. No taxi drivers, tuk tuks, men chasing me down the road wanting to mend my shoes. No market stalls, no one tried to sell me anything or get my attention. Just a couple of joggers. One of whom said ‘g’day mate’ and truly sent my head in a spin. Living up to stereotypes I had walked into the set of neighbours perhaps, a TV version of Australia. Finding public toilets was the next shock. They were open, they were clean, there was running water, it was hot, there was soap and somewhere to dry my hands. There was even toilet paper in the cubicles. I missed Asia terribly. I didn’t know what to do in all this brilliant white sparkling new place. It seemed unblemished and sanitised. I felt very much on my own. Added to that the stark reality (of sorts) that this was the last place Annie visited it made for a surreal experience where I questioned the ground under my feet.

Revisiting then, in the context of Bexhill Museum and the collection held, I am reminded of many of the things that I am continuing to grapple with and understand better. The Aboriginal culture was not evidenced in the Irish bars or the smart cafes of Darwins’ wide streets. Travelling to one of the National Parks, Lichfield, was my first taste of the incredible country and rich history of Australia. Arriving in the wet season, Kakadu and its examples of Aboriginal art were temporarily cut off. Roads flooded. Impressive termite mounds the area is famous for gave me some impression of this being a different land like no other. I chose not to visit crocodile ‘side shows’ designed for tourists, entertained by the proximity of wild and hungry animals. How tantalising it is to be in the presence of creatures with the power to kill you. And as you enter Australia you are told ‘everything can kill you’.

Oceania cabinet, Bexhill Museum (Louise Kenward 2015)

Alas, I digress, I will return. For now I will illustrate my day ‘In Conversation with Annie’ and some of the objects from Northern Australia held at Bexhill Museum. Spears with heads made of beer bottle glass, axe heads of granite and shell pendants decorated in geometric designs. Many artefacts refer to the early settlers arriving in Australia. Planning to run some workshops in the near future I decide to experiment with my own drawing practise and return to using charcoal, trying out some of the things I think might be interesting for others to try. Of some of the wonderful things on display it is a little disappointing the North Australian objects are not especially appealing to draw. An axe head of granite and spears…a challenge. Rolling out paper on the floor in front of the cases, kneeling with charcoal and putty rubber, it is nonetheless an interesting exercise. I consider how vast Australia is, how much variation there is likely to be in objects and designs and I enjoy a return to working with charcoal, the challenge of yet another new texture to attempt.

Working at Bexhill Museum, charcoal & pastels on lining paper (Louise Kenward, 2015)

The process is enjoyable. Working in another part of the museum, feeling more connected to the gallery spaces (literally and metaphorically as I sit on the floor), it feels as though there is at last some loosening up. Movement is key. Different positions of sitting, drawing, different materials. Working with things behind glass pose their own difficulties but with recent experience I imagine handling the spear heads, engaging sense of touch even on a virtual level. The sharpness of the tips, smoothness of the spearhead and consider the making of them, the person who had formed this one I select as my favourite in Northern Australia over a hundred years ago.

Singapore with Annie

Leave a reply

Revisiting Singapore with Annie ‘In Conversation’ and I am finally able to spend time with the pangolin, normally squirrelled away in the Victorian study. He/she has captured something quite distinctive of mine and Annie’s journeys, and has provided fascination and wonder since first sight. Annie was given a pangolin as a present by the ex-Sultan of Johore at which she was rather perplexed:

…”a live little beast, not an alligator, and not an armadillo or a lizard; in fact I do not know what it is; it clings round my arm just like a bracelet…” (A Voyage in the Sunbeam, A. Brassey 1878)

One hundred and thirty seven years on and it is still a creature that captures the imagination. They are not easy to find now and there are not many left. All eight species of pangolin are threatened with extinction and are listed under Appendix II of CITES (the Convention on International Trade in Endangered Species of wild fauna and flora). This means any trade is regulated and monitored. There is a zero export quota for all four Asian species of pangolin. Despite this, pangolins are the most illegally traded mammal in the world (Save Pangolin Association, 2015). Reported as the creature that may become extinct before it is even recognised by many it has been subject of a high profile in the media recently. It is a creature that conjures images of fairytales and fantasy.

Pangolin, Bexhill Museum (Louise Kenward, 2015)

The pangolin is sometimes described as a scaly anteater, a mammal with a tongue longer than its body, they live in trees and burrow in the ground. Solitary, nocturnal animals, they foster a description of being ‘secretive’. With a hard protective shell of scales they roll into a ball to defend themselves and are notoriously difficult to keep in captivity. This makes Annie’s pangolin all the more surprising. When rescued from illegal trade they are difficult to look after and rehabilitate. This focusses conservation efforts on prevention; training rangers and developing education programmes. For more information and links to ways you can help see www.savepangolins.org.

Pangolin (detail), Bexhill Museum (Louise Kenward, 2015)

Annie with pangolin, Bexhill Museum (Louise Kenward, 2015)

I don’t remember seeing any wildlife during my visit, although spent little time in Singapore, my postcard to Annie was hurriedly sent from the airport as I waited for my flight to Jakarta. Just a day or so to explore the stunning architecture of this incredible modern city. The performing arts building on the Esplanade is inspired by the durian fruit, a bridge in the centre of the city is inspired by the structure of DNA. The skyline and the streets are clean. Chewing gum is banned. Slick shopping centres are vast and expensive. The seafood is very good.

Comparing my experiences to Annie’s, things have changed quite considerably:

“the town… [was] not imposing, its streets, or rather roads of wooden huts and stone houses, being mixed together indiscriminately…As soon as the Governor and his suite had set off for Johore we went down into the hot dusty town to get our letters, parcels, and papers, and to look at the shops. There are not many Malay specialities to be bought here; most of the curiosities come from India, China, and Japan, with the exception of birds of Paradise from New Guinea, and beautiful bright birds of all colours and sizes from the various islands in the Malay Archipelago.”

I don’t recall any dust in Singapore but did find the post office Annie visited. Now converted to a hotel.

Work at the museum is progressing. I am writing and drawing, photographing and talking. Displays are being altered and updated, shifted and edited.

In Conversation with Annie: Malaysia

Leave a reply

Revisiting Peninsula Malaysia at Bexhill Museum brings memories of giant shopping centres, palm oil plantations and very long bus journeys.

Looking back through my journal I read about the first things I noticed on reaching Malaysia. I was struck by the peculiarity of the familiar. English is widely spoken, electric sockets are the same as the UK. The wide motorways are soulless. Well manicured, it seemed everything had been tamed. Roads are lined with palm oil plantations. I felt more disconnected from the landscape with a desire to keep going.

Rifling through the museum’s archives, a fly whisk is found. Much later than Annie, it is from the mid 20th century. Made of coconut fibre I become fascinated with the knots of fibre at the base. These curious details become the focus of my drawing, frustratingly hard to keep track of which knot it was I was following.

Fly Whisk, Bexhill Museum (Louise Kenward, 2015)

Annie visited Georgetown and sailed along the Malacca Strait while travelling from Hong Kong to Ceylon (Sri Lanka). A Voyage in the Sunbeam gives the following account:

“While the doctor was on shore, we had been surrounded by boats bringing monkeys, birds, ratan and Malacca canes, fruit, rice, etc to sell, and as I did not care to go ashore, thinking there might be some bother about quarantine, we made bargains over the side of the yacht with the traders, the result being that seven monkeys, about fifty birds of sorts, and innumerable bundles of canes, were added to the stock on board. In the meantime Dr Simon had removed our invalid to the hospital.

Malacca looks exceedingly pretty from the sea. It is a regular Malay village, consisting of huts, built on piles close to the water, overshadowed by cocoa palm and other forms of tropical vegetation. Mount Ofia rises in the distance behind…By one o’clock we were again under way, and once more en route for Penang.” Tuesday, March 20th, A Voyage in the ‘Sunbeam’ Annie Brassey 1878.

Louise is at Bexhill Museum every Thursday, as Artist in Residence she is exploring her journey, with Annie, in the context of the collection in the archives. This is made possible thanks to a Heritage Lottery Fund Grant.

Revisiting St Petersburg with Annie

Leave a reply

From now until June I will be spending my Thursdays at Bexhill Museum as Artist in Residence. Working with artefacts and memories of my journey I will be connecting with Lady Annie Brassey and her travels. Inspired by the archives at Bexhill Museum (in particular Annie’s collection), this is an opportunity to revisit my journey in the context of Annie’s. With Annie as my companion for my travels it seems the ideal way to return to where I began. This time I know Annie a little better, I have written to her regularly, shared her journeys and visited places she has been.

Day one and I am returning to St Petersburg. The first point at which I crossed Annie’s path. She sailed to the Baltics in 1866, I took the train 147 years later. To be honest, I was just glad to get there, anything else in terms of exploration was a bonus. After four days of travelling I had spent two nights on a train, experienced an unnerving border crossing and had been stranded in Belarus in the middle of the night with neither local currency or language. Reaching the one place I had been to previously, it felt like a huge achievement and a familiar face all at once. To meet up here with Annie was lovely, it gave purpose to my stay. I visited the Botanical Gardens, remembered the Hermitage and completed an expedition in looking for a stamp to send a postcard back. My journey had begun.

The Church on Spilled Blood, Louise Kenward 2013

Setting up at the museum this morning I have a large wall space and long wide shelf the length of the wall. The possibilities are tantalising. I come armed with materials, equipment, books and artefacts. An empty tea tin with images of the city on it, a calendar from the Hermitage from my previous visit, tickets, postcards, two small 10 kopek coins, a small stone and three acorns from the Botanical Gardens and a leaf stitched into my diary because that’s where it fell while I was writing. Covering the wall in lining paper I enjoy writing and mind mapping, remembering my trip and Annie’s, and Bexhill’s connections with St Petersburg and Russia. Kate Marsden, nurse, missionary, explorer and writer, and (one of the) founder(s) of the Bexhill Museum joined me on my journey through Siberia. Equipped with fur coat and whistle she left Bexhill in 1891 in search for a cure for leprosy. I am working next to a case dedicated to Kate, there is a spectacular photograph of her wrapped up in many many layers of furs and animal skins. In a book with the same image it describes her wardrobe:

“Her get up consisted of Jaeger clothing; a down filled ulster covered by a sheepskin coat covered by a reindeer skin cloak in which she was unable to bend or to manoeuvre herself into a sleigh.” Hodgson, 2002

Kate was nonetheless very grateful for such clothing:

“I wish to thank you for having persuaded me to wear Jaeger Clothing. Humanly speaking I owe my life to that and not taking stimulants; and I really believe that no woman could have gone through all my dangers, privations and difficulties without both of these aids to health” (Advertisement, cited in Hodgson, 2002).

Kate Marsden in full travelling dress, image courtesy of Bexhill Museum.

Annie Brassey did not suffer such hardship in her travels. ‘Flight of the Meteor’ was published only privately (1866), so it is not possible to be certain, but her travels were not as a missionary with a view to curing leprosy and were generally more comfortable and with greater means than Kate. This isn’t to say that Annie’s travels were frivolous however, she supported many good causes and adopted an approach of education and publicity to a wider audience than Kate would have had access to.

Like Annie, I am a collector, unlike her, I collect with my heart rather than my head. Annie was more thoughtful about her collection, without sentiment she set out (and had means) to collect the finest examples of the finest objects. A collector in a different league to those of her era, she regarded objects as a curator does today, rather than a collector of her time. This brings an interesting dialogue at the outset between me and Annie. Today I have brought my few mementoes of St Petersburg, things connecting with the country and my journey. These included the three acorns, two small coins, stone and leaf from St Petersburg, a small plastic container with lip salve in the shape of a Russian doll given as a gift by a friend before I left (in a bid to find all things tiny). Some postcards and map from the Hermitage bought the previous time I’d visited the city, two oak leaves collected from inside my car which begged to be painted gold, a guidebook on St Petersburg, a map of the city, a metro token, a theatre ticket from attending the ballet and the memory of a small metal pin of an aeroplane that was a gift from a friend and was sadly irretrievably lost in St Petersburg. I took my letter to Annie and my blog posts, and crochet pebbles to ground me.

St Petersburg, leaf stitched into place where it fell. Louise Kenward, 2015

Surrounded by books and objects and with lining paper covering the wall I am soothed and have created a space within which I can explore. With a school visit there is little time or space to think about what I am doing. Their energy and enthusiasm is inspiring. I lower my shoulders and pick up a pen. The morning is spent drawing out thoughts and ideas, recollections and associations, a diagram of my thoughts and interests grow out of the wall. A welcome interruption and the museum curator, Julian Porter, shows me around all the Russian connections on display: a model of a Scourge ship sent to Russia during the First World War; some woolly mammoths, traditionally with a Siberian connection these were found at Eastbourne (long thought to be mole-like creatures because of the common discovery of them underground); a butterfly postcard (one of a series of allies and enemy forces) from World War I. Press cuttings had been found, connecting Bexhill and Russia: Bexhill Observer reports of the Northern Lights in June 1908, later discovered to be the effect from the meteor crash landing in Tunguska, Siberia; and the role the Mayor, a Mr Mayer, of Bexhill had in discovering Anna Pavlova.

I am wondering where to start, how to capture all this, what an incredible breadth of resource and knowledge is held at the museum, and in Julian’s head. I am amazed at how well connected Bexhill is to the rest of the world, and so many eras past, what happens when you scratch the surface. However, the magic is yet to be revealed. Within the archives a number of Russian coins, several from the time Annie would have visited, were found. A second rummage in the archives turns up nothing less than an emerald from the Brassey collection itself, complete with original label. This is Annie’s emerald, collected from Siberia. It is mighty, weighty and rather wonderful.

Brassey Collection, Bexhill Museum, Siberian Emerald (Louise Kenward, 2015)

Siberian Emerald, Brassey Collection, Bexhill Museum (Louise Kenward, 2015)

In Conversation with Annie is supported by an Award from the Heritage Lottery Fund.

Bexhill to Bexhill

A journey by train with a nod to Annie Brassey

Tag Archives: artist residency

Toronto with Annie

Returning to Australia & the Northern Territories with Annie

Singapore with Annie

In Conversation with Annie: Malaysia

Revisiting St Petersburg with Annie