Wednesday 9 November 2016

Into The Woods...It's Time For A Story...


The forest - a place for transformation. What lies in the shadows?


Wild woods and lands are the threshold places where stories can come alive. Are the trees friendly and will they protect us? What happens if we stray from the path? And when we are in the woods what creatures will know we are there? Whose eyes are looking, watching, (waiting), peering though the woody darkness? 


The big bad wolf in a land that never was in a time that could never be
















Beautiful objects and images made using a natural colour palette are put together in our collaborative piece - The Story Cabinet. Here, old and new stories will join and overlap providing a feast for the eyes in three wooden cabinets.  An alternative term for 'fairy tale' is 'wonder tale' from the German Wundermärchen and these cabinets are just bursting with 'small wonders' to bring you the magic of far away realms full of mystery, morals and magical characters.

Let us take you back to a time when humans and animals could talk to each other. Come, peep through a window - a portal to another place - and Join with the story. Those who live there can't see that a giant lurks nearby....

A great while ago, when the world was full of wonders....

Art Nouveau window frames a story
...there was a little window at the back of a house from which a splendid garden could be seen. Full of the most beautiful flowers and herbs, it was however, surrounded by a high wall. No one dared to go into it because it belonged to a wicked enchantress, who had great power and was dreaded throughout the land. 

The couple there had no children and were very poor. All they had was a cow. One day he gave her a bunch of keys that would open any door except one door she must not go in and the key to that door was magical. At last he dropped off to sleep. When he woke up, the room looked so changed. The sun was shining into part of it, and yet all the rest was quite dark and shady. 

Who lives here? - a place of safety or imprisonment?
The tower had neither stairs nor door, but near the top was a little window. A white bird always came to her there and every time the bird threw down to her whatever she had wished for. In the morning she was asked how she had slept. "Oh, very badly!" she said. "I have scarcely closed my eyes all night. Heaven only knows what was in the bed, but I was lying on something hard, so that I am black and blue all over my body. It's horrible!" 

The wicked thought grows all the time like a poisonous plant and slowly kills the good thoughts. A wicked feeling was growing in the stepmother's heart, and she determined to send the children to the witch. She threw one of the shirts over each of them and when the shirts touched their bodies they were transformed into swans, and they flew away over the woods.


Time -  past, present and future.
The next morning she went out and gathered asters and began to sew. She could not speak with anyone and she was warned that she had to return before midnight when the spells would be broken. 

And the pea? The pea was put in the museum, where it may still be seen, if no one has stolen it. 


There, that is a true story.

(But only one of many that could be told).





The Story Cabinet will be exhibited at Hove Museum from December 3rd until April 2017 as part of Fabula Collectives forthcoming exhibition "Many Ways to Tell A Story". 

Come and visit and see if you can find the pea in the museum!

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