On Monday night we enjoyed a very interesting talk from Anne Rogers. Anne told us about how a line drawing, that looked like stitched spirals, on the front over of a book of notes about the poems of Seamus Heaney led her to develop a series of sketches on spirals. During a trip to Ireland she came across a book about Brú na Bóinne, the World heritage site, at New Grange, where the Megalithic Passage Tomb can be seen. This book had the same spirals on it as on the front of the book of notes on the poems.
Anne’s interest in seeing the real spirals took her on journey to the site where she was able to see them first hand, to draw them and photograph them. On her journey back from the trip she hardly lifted her head from her spiral drawings.
This inspiration led to a sketchbook packed with drawings, paintings and sampled methods of creating spirals. It also led to a huge body of work. Most of the work was sold at exhibition but we were lucky enough to be able to see the few remaining pieces. They are, I am sure you will agree, really lovely pieces of work.
Most of you will be familiar with Anne’s talks on the ‘Bags of of Shakespeare’s Heroines’ and ‘The Pilgrim Way’. I can definitely recommend this talk too, you won’t be disappointed. Anne uses imagery from the literature as her usual source of inspiration, as opposed to images in her surroundings. In this work she has combined both.
