The Jordan Maquette has gained a new head, this one in profile.
And American poet, Mr Jeffery Beam, has been spinning magic with words. This is just a taster of what is to come.
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Your glove wounds my heart
I will remove it
making of it a standard
so we may rise to battle
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This post is dedicated to my friend Maria, whose insights into violet gloves and the language of fans, have plunged me and poet Jeffery Beam into unfathomable waters!
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Clive Hicks-Jenkins' Artlog: 
Gosh, that new head is beautiful. The way you combine your exquisite drawing with the energetic shapes and collage elements is masterful, Clive, the result is sheer magic 🙂
Sweetie!
Fantastic – have you ever done any animation? This character would really come alive if you animated him… Thanks very much for the post 🙂 and best wishes.
Jo, I have, and I’ll be doing some more shortly with this maquette, though the primary reason for building it was as a studio aid. See here for some of what I’ve previously produced on the Mari Lwyd theme.
https://clivehicksjenkins.wordpress.com/2014/01/19/edited-footage-of-the-mari-lwyd-for-the-mares-tale/
Hi Clive, I just watched it – brilliant! Thanks for showing me that. How long did it take to film? I hope you do some more.
Not that long. Some of the animation work done for the project was stop-motion, and some was with the maquette manipulated with rods by two puppeteers, though worked on a downward-sloping board, so the puppet parts were always pulling away from them. We had virtually no budget so it had to be fast and simple. Sometimes ‘no budget’ makes you think alternatively.
I can only quote Edgar Degas in response to the rich and insightful conversation which is unfolding, as a result of the “Dark Materials” work:
“Art is not what you see, but what you make others see.”
I look forward to the conversation continuing.
Sarah has such an infinite amount of apt quotes for each and every one of your posts Clive, I can only imagine the size of her bookcase! (and envy the time spent lost in their company) 🙂
Thank you Peter. My bookcase long ago took over the house!(-:
That IS a perfect quote!
This poem, about the “your glove wounding my heart”, and the beautiful poem your friend Sarah (the curious one) wrote under last entry, make me dream…
Because it is not clear ( at least for me, as I am a bit square ) , whether the glove is going to be the pennant, or whether it is going to be the instrument getting the heart out, and it is really the heart which is going to be the pennant.
Like The Pelican, who plucks his own heart out of his chest, to feed his “people”.
A more beautiful and prouder image than the image of the sacrificial lamb, as the Pelican does the sacrificing by himself. Here, it seems to be the beloved who does the plugging of the heart, which is even more generous and more beautiful.
Maria, you have the soul of a poet.
I had always seen the pelican plucking from its breast as being female.
‘The pelican in her piety’.
But your notion of it as being male, catches my imagination, suggesting as it does a quite different kind of sacrifice. Both are moving, but your idea gives me a different reading.
My friend, you are becoming a muse in your own right!
For me, He always was a male. Which makes his self sacrifice more heroic.
I think females have self sacrifice for their young… and maybe even for “The Young”… built into their genes. However, such a compulsion is not obvious in males.
And that is why a Male Pelican who plucks his own heart out in order to feed his “people” is such an exceptionally uplifting and heroic image.
I agree. It does imbue the idea with a kind of tragic heroism.
WOW !
How beautiful !
I don’t know what to say except
Thank You ! ¡ Gracias , Gracias, Gracias !