In this second blogpost in the series, the focus is on 'Interconnections' - for Louise one of the most important pieces in the show. Press here for the link to the first blogpost, published last week.
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| 'Interconnections' - Louise Donovan (2021) |
And here is the guide (with some illustrative fleshing out!)
Interconnections
Silver grey – with fifteen face masks
With movement restricted and friends unseen, Zoom became an important part of my life at times. This has been a period to reflect on who and what is important in my life – and what better vehicle
to spell out my conclusions than the life-saving face mask!
For you to find:
The flag of Wales – wonderful north Wales has been one of our bolt-holes – Martin, the host at the Ty Gwyn inn outside Betws-y-Coed, providing extraordinary food and lodging.
The flag of the USA – in honour of my American artist friend, Jessica.
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| Louise and Rob Donovan by Jessica Raber (2020) - (from a photograph by Zoe Eaton) |
The flag of the Netherlands – in honour of my Dutch friend, Ingrid.
The flag of Poland – my nephew, Chris, and his Polish wife, Aga, are now living in Poland.
The flag of
Greece – with thanks for all those nineteen vacations spent on the Aegean
island of Patmos - and for the friends
we have made there, not least Mikhail
and Elvira, and Nico and Ritsa.
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| Louise Donovan in Hora on the holy island of Patmos in 2018 |
The flag of Greece, honouring the name of its greatest tennis star,
Stefanos Tsitsipas – we all need heroes; Tsitsipas is one of mine.
The flag of New
Zealand – my cousin, Barbara, and my friend, Sue, from Open University teaching days,
are both New Zealanders and I spent a wonderful
month there a couple of decades ago with my father.
The flag of
Scotland – memories of a seminal week in Edinburgh as an East Anglian
representative at a Quilters’ Guild conference.
The flag of
Cornwall – St Ives is now our chosen home, and it was here that the late Roy
Ray (1936- 2021), St Ives artist,
taught me at the School of Painting and helped find the textile artist within
me. Pete Giles and Zoe Eaton are
two other St Ives artists who have played an important part in shaping my art.
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| A Tribute to Bobby Wotnot [aka Pete Giles] - a 2019 piece of textile art, exhibited by Louise Donovan in her November 2021 Crypt Gallery exhibition |
The flag of
Northern Ireland – my nephew,
Alastair, is married to Rachel
who comes from Enniskillen
– and
there is another interconnected set of reasons for this flag: one of my
sporting heroes is the late Alex
Higgins, the snooker legend, and the finest drama I have ever seen was Richard Dormer’s one-man show, ‘Hurricane’,
in which he played the role of Alex Higgins - both Richard and Alex came from Belfast.
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| Alex Higgins (1949-2010) - the snooker legend - and Richard Dormer, the actor - together on stage after a performance of 'Hurricane' in 2003, the year Richard Dormer won The Stage award for Best Actor. |
The flag of the United Kingdom – I am a British citizen. When I was a child and off school with whooping cough, my mother took me into a fabric shop in Gerrard’s Cross and my love affair with quilting began. I became, in time, the maker of textile art wedding presents, not least for the lovely daughters – Jane, Emma, and Tamsyn – of my dear cousin, Sally, and her husband, Keith.
The flag of
Ireland – My married name became
Louise Donovan – my husband
has his roots in both Kent and Ireland.
The flag of Canada
– in honour of my friends, Mel and Dan, and their
sons, Jake and Finn, who emigrated as a family to make a brilliant life for themselves in Ontario.
The flag of
Norwich City football club – celebrating yet another return to the Premiership
– I am the acting secretary of the St Ives branch of the NCFC supporters club. It has two
members – me and Rob.
The flag that gives pride of place to Bearded Collies
– above all, our beloved
Ella dog.
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| Ella Donovan - 2020 |
I hope you have enjoyed this study of interconnections. We all have them - and they can be a joy.
Next week, in the last blog-post of the series, the focus will be on the pieces of textile art in the Crypt exhibition that were completed in 2019 and 2020 before the pandemic was invited to our island.
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