“I’m a creative person“ is usually a statement made by a person who once drew a realistic portrait or wrote a couple of lines of poetry at school, and looks back with fond nostalgia on a creative self that could have been…..if only.

Of course, education and school is part of the problem. At school we are taught to ‘get things right’ to learn facts and figures, to recite the alphabet and ‘say your algebra.’

But ask the teacher; “How do you get a Giraffe into a refrigerator?” and what would the answer be?  Well perhaps you just open the door and put the Giraffe in. OK, then one supposes you would do the same if you wanted to put an Elephant into a refrigerator? NO, NO, NO, that’s a whole different kettle of fish; firstly you would have to take the Giraffe out and THEN put the Elephant in!

Children in creative play street chalking: Manchester 1963

You see being a creative person has nothing to do with ‘getting things RIGHT’; in our world there is no right or wrong. All that’s required is a ‘childlike’ playfulness of mind. Schools and the education machine do a pretty damn good job of knocking these qualities out of people. So by the time you become an adult, you say stupid things like: “I used to be good at art!” and “I wish I could write poetry!” But that’s the thing you see, as adults, we just stop believing that we are creative people. Creativity is something that other, more talented people do. And that’s the nub, if we don’t believe, we don’t become. Life is a bit like that when you think about it, I mean; what separates a tramp from a successful millionaire business man or woman?

Who taught the cavemen to do art? Indeed, everybody can be creative in life, in every aspect of living, it’s a matter of regaining that flexible and playful thinking that we use to practice as children, before we became processed by the education machine, full of noughts and ones, rights and wrongs….the problem with this model is that the universe doesn’t work on binary code.

You don’t have to draw, paint, sing or dance; you just need to start believing in your creative self, remove the creative blockage. Play the truant from yourself.

YES, but HOW do I do it?   WHERE do I start?

Well they often say a change is as good as a rest, holidays are great, and we are always playful on holiday. Talking about your creative self to a sympathetic friend or partner and playing like we did as children. You see, kids don’t think about this stuff, creative thinking is a natural part of their development as human beings. Nobody taught cavemen how to do art, but when Picasso came out of a cave in the south of France and made his famous statement “We have learned nothing!” he was right.

You see the problem is that the education machine has got you in its grip. You’ve become binary conditioned and moulded into a good citizen. Conforming to make money; support the economy and bringing up baby. It’s not exactly rock n’ roll but just imagine; what would happen if we were all free thinking, creative individuals who questioned everything, including  the status quo. There would be anarchy, now there’s an original thought for you. It’s no coincidence that the most creative individuals on this planet are the ones who flunked at school. It’s in society’s interest to knock creativity out of you. In fact, come the revolution and it’s the creatives and free thinking individuals who are the first to be bumped off…..they offer the greatest threat to any regime.

Woooh…..How did that happen? Well the greatest form of creativity surely is destruction, think about it, destroy the past and create a new history and future. I seem to remember that great original thinker and artist Adolf Hitler tried doing that and look what happened to him. OK, bad example, and perhaps we don’t need to go that far, but it just goes to show what can happen to an artist if you undervalue the creative self!

FACT: Most people resent creatives. They resent that they are being paid to ‘have fun’ and paid to do creative stuff, while most of us are stuck in the hovel of  a dead end job doing something we’d rather not be doing, just because we ‘fell into it’ Born to fail. Oh, how I wish my life had been different….If only!

Children in Creative play: New York 1937, Photo by Helen Levitt.

So what’s the big deal about creativity? Well its simple really: CREATIVTY EQUALS LIBERTY.

That’s it; the freedom to express and create makes us feel good. It removes the shackles and drudgery from everyday life. It makes us feel good about ourselves and the world around us; I would say it wasn’t so much a religious awakening, more like a personal journey of discovery. For every creative act is a new learning experience. Not about noughts and ones, rights and wrongs, but about the self & ultimately for the self. It’s probably the best form of therapy you could ever imagine.

And that’s why I do art!

6 Tips for becoming a creative human being:

• Never put yourself down or tell yourself that you can’t do it: Belief in your own sense of ‘the creative self’ is essentially the key. The most creative people in this world are only creative because they believe it. Over time, belief will remove the blockage, trust me!
• Never listen to anybody who tells you that ‘you can’t do it’ If you want to do it, you WILL do it.
• Never make negative comments about yourself through your lips. Saying things ‘out loud’ can somehow make them more real…..write them down, put them into a blog or letter and turn a negative thought into a creative act. Remember feelings change like the wind.
• Play truant from yourself: do something different, physically go to a different place, and experience something new. In life the journey is far more important than the arrival.
• Become a child again: Remember those long, carefree days of childhood, when the summers used to go on forever. The days we used to lay on our backs, drawing pictures in the clouds. THAT’S CREATIVITY FOR YOU!
• Have fun with life.

Remember, the sweetest dreamers are always wide awake!

Here’s an excerpt:

The concert hall at the Syndey Opera House holds 2,700 people. This blog was viewed about 9,800 times in 2011. If it were a concert at Sydney Opera House, it would take about 4 sold-out performances for that many people to see it.

Click here to see the complete report.

I became interested in collecting when I was about 12 years of age, and I’d just moved to ‘big’ school–Whiston Secondary Modern; my first year form teacher Mr Adams was an avid stamp collector and he would often bring his wonderful collection into school. It was like looking through books of ‘sweet things’, I was mesmerised by the colours & designs, and it opened up a whole new world to me, the world of art. The year was 1970 and I had become a Philatelist, PHIL THE PHILATELIST! I couldn’t even pronounce the word but I knew it was important (to me). Inspired by Mr Adams I began collecting stamps; there was no tradition of collecting stuff in the Battle household, indeed the family was very poor even by the standards of the 1970’s and stamp collecting was seen as a posh man’s hobby. Costing money, something trivial that went against the daily grind, “a waste of time” as my uncle Reg used to say. But that didn’t stop me, I was stubborn and the more people told me I couldn’t or shouldn’t do something, the more I did it. It became my own personal rebellion against the family. A place where I could escape the poverty & neglect. I developed an interest that was mine. The interest of an ‘only child.‘ It was my world, created by me. A place that nobody understood or even cared about, but because of that it became even more precious.

You see, the thing about stamp collecting is that it’s much more than just collecting little bits of coloured paper, oh yes, if you want to know about stamps, ask PHIL THE PHILATELIST! I became a little expert on the subject. Not really, but having an interest in something does offer cult like status amongst your peers, either that or you become “that weirdo who collects little pieces of coloured paper for no apparent reason!”

So what attracted me to the genteel world of Philately? Well I quickly realised from an early age that STAMPS are little miniature works of art. Somebody designed and printed these ephemeral little jewels….to me they were just BEAUTIFUL. I knew nothing of art, but of course this ‘art’ had a purpose, it came into everybody’s home, people bought them, sold them, collected them and cherished them. Without one you could never post a letter, write to a loved one, send a parcel or something more official, this was art that had a use, it was of use. Something as valuable as money before you use it and then at the same time something totally worthless at the other end….back then I would never have recognised this as art collecting. The great thing was that most people just threw stamps away. After using them they had no real value, certainly not to the Battle family. I remember looking through Mr Adams stamp albums. He had a magical collection from way back; penny blacks, tuppenny blues, and stamps of all shapes and sizes that had obviously cost a small fortune to collect. They were just beautiful, nicely presented in expensive green & blue binders, mounted and treated like royalty. In my poverty stricken life I had never seen such beauty, for the first time I had seen stamps from all around the world; A half penny green from the Cape of Good Hope, a one shilling orange from Northern Rhodesia , a three pies lilac from India, a four cents orange from Malaya. These were little wonders, jewels from the far flung reaches of the British Empire.

It fired my imagination. I had no money or family encouragement, but I wanted to collect so I started to steam off every stamp that came through the door….this involved the delicate process of holding the envelope above a boiling kettle until the stamp started to peel off, trying hard not to scorch my fingers in the process, easier said than done especially as the kettle was perched above a coal fire and blacken with soot. I don’t know where I learned this trick but grandma (Eleanor Maud) would often chastise me and try to stop me, saying I was “wasting hot water,”  and “you’ll only burn yourself.” My Uncle Reg just laughed at me hoping I’d burn myself. Uncle Peter was indifferent. But I was on a mission to ‘liberate stamps.’

Luckily for me the front part of 105 Kemble Street, Prescot, Lancashire was used as a doctor’s surgery and waiting room by the owner of the house Dr. P.G Saurmy LRCP. I never knew what the LRCP stood for. We use to call him Dr ‘Saumby’ because we couldn’t pronounce his name. An elderly gentleman from India who as well as paying rent to, was also the family doctor. He was a black Indian man. Short, stocky, about the same height as grandma, and on reflection, looking to me every inch like Mahatma Gandhi. Not that I even knew then, what Gandhi looked like, or even who he was. What did I know? To a poor urchin like me he was obviously wealthy; he dressed well, in dark tailor made suits and drove a vintage black Jaguar car as I seem to remember. I think he was well respected in the Prescot community as his twice weekly surgeries, were always well attended.

I hit on the brilliant idea of sneaking into the surgery after hours, this was easily done as the only thing dividing the family living room and the surgery was a thin wooden screen, this jutted out into our living room. The waiting room and the surgery where side by side. Patients literally had to walk out of the waiting room, into our living room, turn a sharp left at the dividing screen and left again into the surgery. I was told that the screen was built from reclaimed old doors long ago by my grandad. It was stained and gloss varnished in a streaky brown colour, and could be opened or shut concertina style from the middle of the partition.

I use to go in at night when grandma was having an evening nap and Uncle Peter and Reggie had gone to the pub. I swiched on the light. The surgery was illuminated by a dim single clear light bulb dangling on a wire from the high ceiling. Inside was an Aladdin’s caves of ‘stuff’.  Imagine if you will a Victorian pharmacy, dark wooden panelling from the floor to the ceiling and shelves and cabinets full of old medicine bottles of all shapes and sizes.  It had a particular smell; chalky medicinal, wooden, milk of magnesium mixed with peppermint. Hard to describe but even harder to forget, I was surrounded by ‘poisons.’ I had to be careful when entering not to move anything, or if I did, that I put it back in exactly the same place for fear of Dr Saumby or grandma discovering my twilight capers. The room was cluttered but ordered and in the far left hand corner was a cabinet with pull out draws full of medical records and amongst these where letters and correspondence……on finding these I decided to give myself the very important task of ‘liberating the stamps’ from certain decay and destruction. So I took on the nightly, exciting, duty of sneaking into the surgery and rummaging through the hundreds of files and draws looking for stamps. I would simply tear them off envelops, notes & receipts but being careful not to disturb anything too much for fear of being found out, but of course I never was.  To others, they were worthless but to me they were my little treasures, my window into another world, I used to look at them with wonder….when were they posted, where from & by whom? they represented little snap-shots, ephemeral moments lost in time. How could anybody design such a beautiful thing and yet be so tiny? Collecting stamps from Dr Saumby’s surgery was free and easy and before long I soon had a sizable collection, mostly the same dating from the early sixties, late fifties. King George V and Queen Elizabeth. Hundreds of penny blues, tuppenny browns & ha’penny orange, all beautifully engraved with the queen’s head, but also some rarer finds, a few Victorian penny reds and high value two & six penny’s from the time of King George V.

some of the ‘liberated’ stamps from Dr Saumby’s surgery (c. 1970)

It got me going, it was the start and awakening of many things in me, my interest in art & design, travel & history.

Of course the doctor’s free supply of ‘liberated’ stamps was not inexhaustible and sooner or later I would have to find fresh supplies so I began to turn my attention to the local rubbish tip. In the early 70’s this was known as Browns Field and ‘the old cars’ in those days rubbish tips where very much open ground and anybody could just more or less wonder on to them, so after school me and a few like-minded mates would go down to the tip looking for stamps! It seems mad to think about it now but anything that looked remotely like an old envelope with a stamp on it was fair game. We used to have competitions to see who could collect the most stamps. The only people on the tips in them days where a few old men looking for scrap metal to sell, (my Uncle Peter was one of them) and us, a little gang of ragamuffin kids looking for stamps…..tell that to kids today and they won’t believe you. To us it was deadly serious, (everything is in childhood), we were searching for treasure. The hope of unearthing a PENNY BLACK or something even rarer, we were like a 1970’s children’s ‘time team.’ Archaeologists looking for stamps, in the sure and certain hope that we’d find one stamp to make us rich and famous beyond our wildest dreams.  Of course as luck, or the lack of it would have it….this never happened!

But all the same, we did find lots of stamps! Working the rubbish tips was not without its hazards, we did come across the rotting corpses of dead dogs, rats and rotting foodstuff. The smell at times could be overpowering, but hey, we were kids! It amazes me today just how much freedom we had back then. You cannot even imagine kids wondering around rubbish tips today. Things where different back then!

In time my kindly Uncle Peter would give me some pocket money to buy a little cheap stamp album and some hinges from the local newspaper shop and as my interest grew I might even go to Woolworths and buy a packet of 100 assorted stamp from around the world for about 10p, complete with a free plastic magnifying glass. Amazing value! The funny thing about stamp collecting is that once you start you never stop, and even today 40 years on I’m still on the lookout for unusual and rare stamps, and before you ask, yes; I still have my collection from all those years ago full of ‘liberated’ stamps from Dr Saumby’s surgery and rescued stamps from the rubbish tips in Prescot. They are amongst the only few physical ’attactments’ that remain from 105 Kemble Street….

Draft cover: How I Became Chalk Boy (2010)

Taken from my un-published autobiography: HOW I BECAME CHALK BOY! (The Little boy who grew up with Eleanor Rigby)

Look at your watch!

From now on; anything related to UrbanCanvas street art can be found HERE! This follows my work, together with my partner; Catherine McMahon Travels across the UK and abroad producing visual street-art for festivals and events.

For anybody interested in the history of pavement art, visit ALL MY OWN WORK. This site is dedicated to my own personal research. For the first time ever, anywhere I have collected together stories and archive material on the history of this previously poorly documented art-form.

Don’t forget you can also visit our website: UrbanCanvas, our YouTube channel, and our Facebook page.

This blog will now, mainly be used to blog my own thoughts, travels and interests….and with this I thank you!

2011 Competition ID badge- GOCKER

•          We have seen that the festival is getting a large deal of attention in the UK, Hong Kong, and Mexico, as well as a jump in attendance from last year via your FB page. Where do you see the growth of the festival in the next 1-3 years in terms of community, sponsors, perhaps extended sister festivals? 

Yes, there has been an increase all round, according to the people with the clickers; footfall has gone up from 14,000 people last year to 20,000 this year. Also the number of artists taking part, in 2008 we started with 14 local  artists, this year we had almost 40 with a 50/50 split between local/UK and international artists.

The event has developed from a one day competition to a six day celebration of pavement art and is now part of Liverpool’s annual Bold Street Festival.  The James Carling competition is considered to be the UK’s premier festival of this art form and this is reflected in the quality of art & artists taking part. Also in the way that funders and local businesses have more than tripled their investment in this year’s event as compared to last year. It’s important to note that all funding is from private investment via City Central BID. This means that we don’t take the tax payers pound or rely on arts council funding, which in this current economic climate can be problematic.

With regards to the festival growth in coming years, we have always viewed this as an organic thing, I’m sure you know the Kevin Costner film FIELD OF DREAMS “build it and they will come” well that’s very much our philosophy, it is not our ambition to become the biggest event ever; we do know of festivals that engage 100’s of artists, they all seem very well organised and attract lots of attention amongst both the arts community and the public. But the bigger the event, the bigger the headache and the number of paymasters you have to satisfy.

We are more interested in the experience and ‘atmosphere’ being created for both the artists taking part and the public visiting. We are not interested in the WOW factor or attracting big named ‘celebrity’ artists, if they want to come well that’s fine but it’s always been about the little things and what impression the individual takes away with them, that’s how you grow an event, through word of mouth.

We always ask the question “did the person taking part or visiting enjoy the experience?”  Little things matter like “is the surface suitable for great pavement art?” and “is this something we’d like to visit or take part in ourselves?”

When I talk about ‘atmosphere’ I’m describing something that is often forgotten about or dismissed, most street art events are centred around the ‘competition’ or the physical reality of the production of great pavement art; there is nothing wrong with this and in many ways it seems to be the most logical approach. But for us this is just the by-product of the creative process. We take a more artist-centric approach.

Pavement Artists do much more than this, they actually curve time and space. By creating art in a public place they enter into a ‘zone’ where time slows down, they are in a different physical reality than the people who visit and observe the
art. So what effect does this have on the event?

Well it changes the ‘atmosphere’ a once drab, uninteresting square in the middle of a big city becomes transformed into a relaxed & friendly place to be, strangers start talking to each other and children start creating art & laughing and magic is unleashed. We don’t understand all the dynamics of this but then we don’t have to, all we need to know is that it works.  To make sure it works we insist on no distractions, no loud music, no performers etc. in the immediate vicinity, these are the details that many event organisers tend to misunderstand…… pavement art doesn’t need any of that stuff, it’s a performance art within its own right and within its own time zone and this is what we should be celebrating. We have been at events where pavement artists are competing with Brass bands & street performers and it doesn’t work, the organisers are just missing the point.

In terms of festival growth & sponsorship these have different agendas such as foot-fall, value to the local economy and positive marketing opportunities for the city; in this difficult economic climate pavement art is uniquely placed and could actually benefit from a recession. People will always want to enjoy art & culture and where better than in a public place….it’s cheaper/free to watch and participate and I think it’s one future for development. The event will change and develop organically as long as we stay true to our core values. Of course the venues and funders may change but after three years we have developed a great working model with excellent local/national & international arts community support. Local people who we have no connection with have started to blog it, sharing videos and photos on-line and taking ownership over the event and that’s very satisfying.

We are all in favour of extending to ‘sister’ festivals as long as we understand what this involves and we can count on local support for cultural exchange funding. We have had a conversation with Rosy Loyola from Festival Bella Via, Mexico about this and indeed this year we entered into a tentative arrangement where two Mexican artists came to Liverpool with flights paid for by Bella Via and we covered meals, travel within the UK and accommodation. This worked quite well and we loved having them here; we would dearly like to build on this relationship but we must make sure we have funding opportunities or sponsorship in place before we enter into formal arrangements.  We are also interested in linking to more local events like those in Toulon in France and Utrecht in Holland.

It’s important to note that we are just lowly pavement artists organising this event from an artist centric view point, so unlike some organisers we are not directly connected to local authorities, marketing or arts council funding…so finding out were money is available and how we can access it can take a little more effort!

2011 competition ID Badge- Judge

•          Your thoughts on the children’s’ area of the festival, we are always excited about seeing the street painting (screeving) art form shared and encouraged to future artists.

The Little Chalkers Competition is one of our favourite bits, we organise it on exactly the same lines as the main adult competition where children have to register, are given a pitch & some chalks and enter into competition with other children in their age category. It’s a great feature and one of mine & Catherine’s favourite places to hang out! This year we had almost 100 children taking part, all inspired by the amazing works being produced. To us the children’s competition is a core element to the event, it’s also key from an historical point of view, we must remember that Victorian pavement artist James Carling was only 5 years of age when he went onto the streets as a poor urchin, and became known as ‘The Little Chalker’

Street art is a great way to promote creativity, it ticks all the boxes; it’s performance, visual, physical, creative and playful……remember the olden days when kids used to ‘play-out’ well they don’t do that anymore, or very rarely, many reason for that, but street art offers the opportunity for creative play and that can only be a good thing, also it sets the scene for future artists and festivals leaving the next generation with a really positive impression of this art form that we love so dearly; only time will change people’s perceptions and the so called ‘stigma’ of pavement artists as ‘beggars’ will remain well and truly in the past.

On top of that if we light a flame in only one of those children, who feels inspired enough to believe they could grow up and become an artist then our job is complete….there are not enough artists in the world. Perhaps if there were then wars would be a thing of the past? It’s just a theory!

2011 Little Chalkers Eflyer

•          Let’s discuss the growth of the local screevers, whom are the artists to see and what did they do for the festival this year?

The Liverpool term for a pavement artist is GOCKER, it’s thought to originate in Ireland and was first used by James Carling in 1870.

You know it’s always gratifying to see local artists returning year after year. This started out as a local art event in 2008 and when we introduced an international element to it as we did last year we weren’t sure how the local artists would take to it. Some people did get upset by the prospect of artists coming in from ‘outside’ as they saw it, but most artists have risen to the challenge, realising that there is much to be gained in the cross pollination of art & culture that benefits everybody. The artists we’ve really been impressed with are the likes of Keith Fearon from Liverpool and Christine Edwards from Manchester who before 2008 had never done street art and now they are major prize winners at this year’s event. Also the artists from other parts of the UK like Heike Brinkman from London, Alex Hobby from Newark & Annabel Slater from Oxford.

They all bring their unique talents and vision to the event. We also have a soft spot for our new first timers like Martin Joseph from Liverpool who has never done pavement art before but won a prize at this year’s event.  If you had asked me that question a few years ago I would have struggled to name anybody but it just goes to show that events like this create opportunities for artists that previously didn’t exist. The opportunity to create, shine and learn from others and the chance to share your talents with the world & travel….this can only be a good thing right?

Also we’ve noticed the distinct differences in approach and subject matter between the British, Dutch, Italian, American & Mexican artists; although we are all artists there are differences and it’s something to be celebrated, these differences extend to the festivals and events organised around the world, I know for a fact that an Italian style event such as the one in Nocera, Italy would not work in the UK and probably visa-versa. But the main thing is that we are all creating art and engaging with our public. It’s a great feeling to be part of an international arts movement that is outside the confines of the arts establishment and exists in spite of them and without them!

2011 Event Logistics ID Badge

•          Any other items that would be good for us to post but aren’t really enhanced in other posts in social media?

 One of the important things for us was to connect with the past; have a sense of place and remember where you have come from, so when we heard about the story of James Carling back in 2008 from a local history group it seemed natural  for us to organise an event in his name. Until recently the story of pavement art & artists has been poorly documented and the Carling story is one of the very few early accounts and records, it could easily make for a good film. We were pleased to see Kurt Wenner featuring James Carling in his new book The Asphalt Renaissance.

James Carling has sent us on a journey to discover more and we found records, photos, publications and ephemera of   largely unknown pavement artists across the UK and beyond.  The world we live in today is a million miles away from these street artists….a world in which pavement artists have the luxury to write books, travel the world, earn a good living and even become famous through working the paving stone, this would have been unimaginable back then.  And that’s why James Carling matters; it reminds us of where we came from, who we are. It informs our world and gives gravity to our culture and that’s why we celebrate.

For a list of all the winners from 2011 visit The James Carling web-page.

For up to the minute photos of the event visit The Liverpool Chalk Circle on Flickr.

For up to the minute news on next year’s event join The James Carling Facebook Group.

For more info on the history of pavement art or to share your own stories ‘LIKE’ our ARTISTS OF THE PAVING STONE page on Facebook.

For more info on UrbanCanvas street art activities ‘LIKE’ us on Facebook.

© Philip Battle (UrbanCanvas)

Liverpool, United Kingdom.
21^st October 2011

“The tale of Irish offspring James William Carling (1857-1887) is of someone creating art and beauty in the face of adversity and abject poverty. It is often said that artists are the eternal optimists, creating beauty were none existed before. The transformation of a single lowly flagstone into a beautiful and valuable work of art is simple and magical, ephemeral. Like butterflies on a summers day, a fleeting glimpse into another world, a child’s memory of jumping into pavement paintings. To marvel at the artists skill and imagination, effectively saying; there must be more to life than this!

Victorian pavement artist: JAMES WILLIAM CARLING as a boy.

 As a boy James begged and screeved on the streets of Liverpool out of desperation; to eat, to feed himself and his family, to save them from starvation and the workhouse. His reward was to be thrown into prison, to be mocked and looked down upon by the aristocracy of the day.

James once wrote:

“for in Bold Street, the promenade of the aristocracy, the pavement artist did not draw”

the full description goes like this: “Bold Street! My heart sickens at your name. And well it might, for I not only could not draw in that street I could not walk on it. The sight of a ragged coat was enough to bring the harsh ‘move on’ or what was worse, the most brutal application of the staff. On Bold Street, promenade of the aristocracy, the Gocking (pavement artist) did not draw”

JAMES WILLIAM CARLING 1880

How fitting then in Liverpool’s year as European Capital of Culture 2008 that we reflect on the past and stand on the shoulders of our forefathers and say

“in Bold Street, the promenade of the ordinary people, the pavement artist WILL DRAW!”

2011 is our third year of presenting this event, for those wishing to find out more about this years competition you can join our James Carling Facebook group for updates and to download application forms you can visit our UrbanCanvas website!

]]> http://philipbattle.wordpress.com/2011/08/25/the-james-william-carling-pavement-art-competition-2008/feed/ 0 0.000000 0.000000 0.000000 0.000000 philipbattle James as a Boy http://philipbattle.wordpress.com/2011/08/03/when-did-you-last-see-your-grandfather/ http://philipbattle.wordpress.com/2011/08/03/when-did-you-last-see-your-grandfather/#comments Wed, 03 Aug 2011 18:56:53 +0000 Philip Battle http://philipbattle.wordpress.com/?p=1677 ]]> History makes you think….I wonder what would have happened if my grandfather had never travelled to England, or met my grandmother, had never given birth to my father and so on. The remarkable thing is that we, as individuals exist at all, it’s against all the odds, a lottery of life, by accident or design that we now ride on the tidal wave…….we are riding on the crest heading towards the shore. But thats the thing about waves, they are very short lived; we are following on from countless numbers of waves that have crashed to shore, pushed on by even more that are to follow!

It’s no coincidence that the cycle of life mimics the natural rhythms of the universe.

Often we get wrapped up in our little worlds; our tiny speck of existence in this great ocean of humanity. But every now and again we come face to face with our own mortal reality. The mask of youth has slipped, giving way to another beauty secret….the secret of living each and every moment as if it was your very last on earth; easier said than done sometimes.

Last weekend (29th to 31st July 2011) saw us taking part in the 3 day Spraoi International Street Arts Festival in Waterford, Ireland which was a very fine event indeed. As a special treat we decided to take a short detour & stop off at the medieval city of Kilkenny on our return to Liverpool.

In 1885, my grandfather, Thomas Battle was born here, this was his home town. I know very little of him other than the fact that he was born here and had a brother who was killed in the First World War. From what I can gather, he moved to North West England in the 1920’s where he met my grandmother (Eleanor Maud Rigby) in Speke, a suburb of Liverpool but was then part of the district of Lancashire. They married & raised a family in Prescot & Whiston; Eleanor gave birth to my father in 1930 (also named Thomas) and five other sons.

I met my grandfather when I was a very young child in the early 1960’s. I must have been about 2 or 3 years of age & my grandfather was living in the shed he built at 105 Kemble Street, the one seen on the left in the photo of him on a motorbike. Don’t ask me why he lived in the shed other than the fact that it was an exceedingly good shed, with its own fireplace and a bed tucked away under the long workbench…..Grandmother lived in the house and it seems to have been an arrangement that suited them both, perhaps it kept them together in some strange way. I’ve been told that a lot of people use to live in sheds in the ‘olden days’ not sure how true that was but the Battle family used to live in a caravan in the 1920′s & this was a common sight around Liverpool and the north west of England. So perhaps living in a shed reminded grandad of his time as a young journeyman? who knows!

Grandad; Thomas Battle in the backyard of 105 Kemble Street, Prescot (1950's)

He died in the shed in February 1961 from a stroke aged 76…..apparently he went into a comer and passed away. He was buried in Prescot Parish Church cemetery, England on the 14^th February 1961. Eleanor Maud had instructed the Co-operative Funeral Services Ltd to carry out the arrangements. Their receipt stated that Thomas had;

A polished oak coffin, fully mounted with silver plated fittings, engraved silver name tablet. Upholstered with linings and trimmings and flannelette robe.”

At a princely sum of £45-13 shillings and 9 pence. This also included R.I.P. fittings, a motor funeral car, two mourners to follow the car, removal from hospital & grave drapings with personal superintendance throughout!

Eleanor paid it off in four instalments with the last one being paid on the 5th March 1962.

My grandfather was described to me as an Irish ‘journeyman’ A man who served his apprenticeship in a trade and worked as a fully qualified employee. The term originated in the regulations of the medieval trade guilds; it derives from the French journée (‘a day’) because journeymen were paid daily. A journeyman would travel the country looking for work; grandfather was a skilled joiner and wheelwright and would make his living repairing wooden cart wheels and the like.

Visiting Kilkenny for me was almost (but not quite) like going home. It was a place where my uncle Peter (James Peter Battle) always wanted to visit but never did. Peter was my grandfather’s eldest son born in Whiston in a brown caravan in 1929; he recently died in April 2011. He would always talk of wanting to go to the home of his father Thomas so this visit offered me an opportunity to do something special for both my grandfather and Uncle Peter. For grandad I decided to take along photograph of him taken in the 1950’s and have myself photographed with it outside an old building in Kilkenny; one that my grandad may have remembered, shopped or even worked in as a boy.

Me and grandad outside Dores in Kilkenny

 I found Dores shop on the corner of the high street. This is the local butchers, established in 1888 when my grandfather was only 3 years of age (the exact same age that I was when I met him!), so I felt certain that he must have known of this shop, in fact a lot of Kilkenny looks like it hasn’t changed much since the 1800’s, apart from becoming a bit of a tourist town, I can imagine it looking very similar in his day.

So that’s the first part of my mission completed, it’s almost like life coming full circle, his image and presence hasn’t been seen on these streets for over 100 years and now here he is…with his grandson, myself and Catherine; back on the streets of Kilkenny, my own homage to the past; tipping my hat to what has been…..

History is all around us, it’s within us and without us even realising it at times….we are all caught in the arrow of time; in a place where it is impossible to go back; good or bad, changing the past is not an option but coming to terms with it and accepting what you have become because of it is; this is a universal truth…..

The second part of my mission was for Uncle Peter. I always regret never taking him to visit Kilkenny, it was one of the very few places we never took him to, and he was always talking about it, even just before he died. So for this we (myself & Catherine) decided to take something personal to Peter and leave it in Kilkenny & also to bring something home that he would have liked had he been alive.

Uncle Peter's silver tobacco tin

We took a silver tobacco tin that Peter always used to roll his own cigarettes; this dated from the early 1900’s and was possibly even, once owned by my grandfather. It was full of tobacco so we put a black ribbon around it. We had no idea where we were going to leave this but we took time out to look around Kilkenny Castle and then Catherine came up with the great idea to leave it in the castle….PERFECT; Peter would always say that The Battle family were related to royalty (even though it was never true). Well now, quite literally Peter IS related to royalty, in spirit at least.

Peter's tobacco tin and the urn in which we hid it.

We hid his silver box in an urn just outside the state rooms, in one of the most majestic part of the castle. It’s a place where nobody will find it immediately but someday a cleaner may come across it, it has no inscription or indication of where it came from so it may even end up as part of the castles own collection and may even be displayed there someday in the future. I like that idea; a part of Uncle Peter, the son of a Kilkenny ‘journeyman’ in the royal castle at Kilkenny. Just imagine that…..Peter would have loved it I’m sure!

Catherine enjoying a cup of tea outside The Kilkenny Art Cafe

I found Kilkenny to be a very comfortable place, I’m not Irish just second generation English but I felt at home here, the people were marvellous as they are right across Ireland and we look forward to our return to the land of our ancestors soon, perhaps next time we’ll visit the city of Cork where Catherine’s grandfather comes from!  :-))

Flying over the Alps to Naples-iPod photo

Two weeks ago (19^th-23rd May 2011) saw us
travelling to Naples, Italy. (Yes, I know, we live the lives of international rock
stars….but without the rock star bank balance I’m afraid!)

The idea was to research how the Italians present street art
& to see if we could pick up any tips, but of course it could just be one
big excuse for having a good time. Although after reading all the on-line blogs
and reviews about how Naples was “the crime capital of Europe” & “don’t
take anything valuable with you & sew your money into your underclothes “
& “don’t be surprised if you wake up in the morning sleeping next to a horse’s
head”  it did make me wonder if we’d made
the right choice here??

I mean, how bad can Naples be?….a hotbed of crime? Home of
the Mafia and mountains of rubbish on the street; Pickpockets and rapists at
every turn? So I thought I’d do a bit of research for myself and the first
thing I found was a Google Maps street view of our hotel: Correra 241….I showed
this to Catherine and her first reaction was…”what is this ‘shit hole’ you are
taking us to?” and to be honest my spirits sank. This; coupled with the fact
that unlike every other Italian city: Rome, Florence, Venice, Pisa etc. Naples
was the only one that didn’t have a Lonely Planet Guide Book or any form of
book dedicated exclusively to that city….the one we eventually picked up was
the DK Eyewitness travel guide: Naples & Amalfi Coast.

Now I don’t know about you but this set alarm bells ringing
and the first thing it says to me is that this city is NOT INTERESTING enough
for an exclusive guide book and forget the Lonely planet…….even Naples is off
that radar. So our picture of Naples was complete: A dirty, rat infested shit
hole where tourists feared to tread, the arse hole of Europe where nobody in
their right mind would venture!!

So with that picture in mind we set off from Liverpool
Airport and our 3 hours Easyjet Flight to Naples, this was greatly assisted and
shortened with the aide my iPod loaded with my favourite movies; The Godfather
parts 1, 2 & 3. (OK, I made that bit up but you get the picture!)

Our landing at Naples airport was quite spectacular….a
bright sunny morning in May, about 10.30am local time and fantastic views of
the mountain ranges that surround the city together with odd glimpses of Mount
Vesuvius, Europe’s only continental active volcano. Unusually for city
airports, Naples is situated close to the city centre which meant negotiating a
flight path over heavily populated suburbs which was quite hair-raising in
itself.

TOUCHDOWN….we’d arrived and after check-out and security we
made our way to the Bus station for our short journey into the centre of town.
The bus dropped us off at Corso Garibaldi, right outside the main train and
metro station….with our hotel being on the opposite side of the city, the next
job was to figure out a way to get to our hotel. We could have just jumped a
taxi of course but I’ve always found that the best way to discover a new city
is NOT to rely on taxis but to find your own way around, be independent and in
that way it benefits the rest of your stay because you know the lay of the land
from the off. So armed with my trusty map of the city and two x’s pencilled in…one
where we were dropped off and one were we needed to be (our hotel) we proceeded
to find the metro station nearest to our hotel. This happened to be Montesanto which
was about two stops across the city from Garibaldi; this was still quite a walk
from our hotel so a healthy tip here is to travel light. We only had one medium
sized suitcase (with wheels) and a couple of rucksacks, so it made for a pleasant
warm 75 degrees, May morning stroll through the back streets of Naples.

Catherine: our first view of Nalpes walking from Montesanto metro to our hotel

By the time we arrived at the hotel we thought we knew the
city really well; we negotiated the bus, the metro and the streets of this strange
and new city and felt a sense of achievement. WE DID IT all by ourselves…Yippie!

You see that’s the thing about travelling abroad, it can
seem quite daunting and you do need time to work out how things work, what’s
what and making mistakes are all a part of the journey but it is just the best feeling
on earth to go independent and really get under the skin of a place, it doesn’t
half make travelling FUN!!

The buildings and accommodation around our hotel reminded us
very much of Paris, you know that kind of ‘high-rised’ feel with people living
cheek by jowl and little Parisian style ironwork balconies where people would hang
out their washing or tender their little balcony gardens…..at first sight it
looked very much like the images from Google Maps……The graffiti ridden &
litter strewn streets that had seen better days, complete with that faint sweet,
sickly smell of decay, the type that reminds you of the colour brown …..Of
course it’s no coincidence that Naples reminds us of Paris as the French had indeed
colonised the city in the past and to my mind that French influence was still all
around in the architecture if not the culture.

View from our hotel looking up F.Savero Correra

We entered our hotel (Correra 241) through a court yard and up a flight of
steps off F. Saverio Correra (street) and where pleasantly surprised to see a
large, light and airy reception area painted in bright primary colours and surrounded
by a rooftop garden furnished with exotic potted plants and a very comfortable
seating area for guests. It was like entering another world and in complete
contrast to the street below and outside.

But this is one of the things we were about to discover
about Naples…..all is not what it seems to be and to NEVER judge a book by its
cover!

Room at Hotel Correra 241- ipod Photo

The staff on reception were happy and friendly and showed us
to our room which was equally impressive for a 3 star hotel…a nice, clean and roomy
two tier affair with the bathroom and toilets being up a flight of stairs to
the left of the entrance; but again painted in nice cheery primary colours that
gave out an air of relaxation and calm…OK, that’s it; this is going to be a fun
vacation!

Room at Hotel Correra 241- ipod Photo

Our primary objective; to find and check in to our hotel before midday…NOW RELAX and plan our first afternoon in Naples….Base camp has
been established!!!

View from our Hotel room, looking towards Via E. Pessina

After a couple of hours in our hotel room, unpacking,
resting and planning our itinerary we headed off to explore the city around 2pm….if
you come away on a holiday with Phil & Cath don’t expect to sit around on a
beach doing nothing….we don’t do beaches and sitting around doing nothing is
NOT on our agenda. Nothing is what we do when we die…..and at the end of the day
you only get out of something what you are prepared to put into it so off we
trot.

Arrival at Museum-iPod photo MUSEO ARCHEOLOGICO

Our first stop was the Museo Archeologico Nazionale (National Archaeological
Museum) which happened to be ideally situated just round the corner from our
hotel. This has been described as one of the world’s top museums of ancient
art.

Incredible mosaic Art from Pompeii- iPod photo MUSEO ARCHEOLOGICO

That is NOT an overstatement….we were absolutely overwhelmed by the wealth
of beautiful and priceless objects on display. From ancient Rome and many parts
of Italy but also the irreplaceable objects from Herculaneum & Pompeii; Mosaics,
Bronze and marble sculptures, jewellery and domestic items, all painting a vivid
picture of Roman life. This was just an art lovers paradise….We must have looked
like little children in a sweet shop who just couldn’t stop smiling.

Aphrodite (nice derriair)- iPod photo MUSEO ARCHEOLOGICO

But that’s just a part of it….the building where all this stuff was housed was a work of art in itself- built in the 16^th
century as headquarters for the royal cavalry and converted 200 years later
into a museum, with marvellous celling paintings décor we just didn’t know
where to look…it was brilliant and way beyond our expectations.

The Farnese Bull-iPod photo MUSEO ARCHEOLOGICO

At that moment, Naples had hit us straight between to eyes
and all that rubbish and nonsense we had been mis-led to believe about this fine city
had just melted away in one fell swoop…..

on leaving the museum we headed across the road to Liberty’s situated in the beautiful Piazza
for a slice of pizza and a well-earned glass of Peroni beer!

Having a beer at Liberty's

And as we were to discover over the next few days…..Naples is a very
beautiful, fine & cultured place to be! more to come…

To be continued………

Just uploaded a bunch of 3D photos from last weekends trip to Naples. You need red & cyan glasses to see these in 3D….people usually have a couple of pairs of the cardboard one’s knocking around the house…somewhere.

These photos where shot in REAL 3D and designed to be watched on a 3D viewer or REAL 3D TV. I’ve converted them here to anaglyph so if you don’t have any of those things you can still see them in 3D on your monitor……Aaaaaar, the wonders of technology )

The National Wallace Monument, Stirling, Scotland 2011 Photo: Philip Battle

 John Barbour wrote in 1375 “Ah, freedome is a noble thing”  Was the same then as it is now; we find ourselves at the opposite end of the realm, on an island and one of the very few places in Britain occupied by Nazi Germany. A different time and a different place maybe but the principals remain the same….invaded and oppressed by an alien & aggressive force. This was the inspiration for our street art event; War of the Worlds, our own interpretation of the ‘tripods from Mars’ as featured in HG Wells famous novel. We were to be situated on Victoria Pier, the middle of three piers in St. Peter Port; the main coastal town in Guernsey and about a three mile drive from the airport.

St. Peter Port, Guernsey 8th May 2011

We arrived on the morning of Sunday 8^th May and the place seemed very quiet, it was hard for us to imagine what Liberation Day was going to be like. We’d been told it was going to be very busy but on arrival our first thoughts were: “where is everybody hiding!!”  St. Peter Port itself is very pretty, a little harbour town with meandering streets, bobbing boats, crystal clear waters and picturesque views.

First stop was a site visit on Victoria Pier where we bumped into Kate & Alex from the Guernsey Event Company; these are the folk responsible for putting this whole thing together. People may not realise that events on this scale take a lot of effort, mostly unseen. It’s very hard work ensuring that thousands of people enjoy themselves, seamlessly and unseen. Event’s organisers are often unsung heroes; people only tend to notice them when things go wrong!

After getting the ‘run down’ from Kate & Alex we took a stroll around the harbour and onto Castle Cornet; an ancient harbour fortress on the south side of St. Peter Port, one of the most prominent features on the harbour front. The castle was modified by the Germans in 1942 with massive gun emplacement designed to protect the harbour against attack. This was the perfect place to do a bit of research into the occupation and get some idea on what it must have been like to be invaded by a foreign force.

It seems like the people of Guernsey take Liberation Day VERY seriously, it is after all their national day when the entire island comes together in celebration, unlike the rest of the UK it’s been decreed a bank holiday with the 9^th being a Monday this year. It was of course the 9th of May 1945 when Guernsey was liberated from German occupation.

The following day, Liberation Day was in total contrast to the day we arrived….”where did all these people come from?” I asked; and more importantly “where were they all hiding on this tiny Island??” St. Peter Port was just heaving, we were on-site at 8.10am for a 10 am start and even at that time people were around watching the local school children cross country running and other activities going on up and down the harbour front. It was a fine sunny morning with very little wind so people had turned out in force, the signs where that this was going to be a tough gig. By tough I mean busy; VERY BUSY!!

War of the Worlds CHALK ROBOT- Liberation Day, Guernsey 2011

 Our chalking art robot was a big hit with the kids and adults too with parents joining in throughout the day, we struggled a bit with crowd control and not enough barriers which meant that people were walking through the art (as they do)….it was just the case of the sheer numbers of people on the pier where threatening to overwhelm us at times. This made the event a bit stressful. Involving the public in creating a piece of art that is aesthetically pleasing on the street and in a live situation is no easy task….

War of the Worlds CHALK ROBOT- Liberation Day, Guernsey 2011

 We stopped the workshop twice throughout the day just to regain control but all in all things were going well until about ten past four when the heavens opened and washed away all our hard work….the frustrating thing was not that we got rained off but that we got rained off before we’d finished the art. Street art is always a gamble against the elements and you accept the fact that the work you produce is only temporary in nature. There is no point in being precious about your work, it’s the nature of the art but on this occasion we were less than an hour away from completion and that’s where the frustration lies in the uncompleted work.

Freedom can mean many things to many people; the freedom to express love,  to play, to roam and to dream and so on and that’s the great thing about Liberation Day, it’s not just about liberty (whatever that means) but about the ideals and ephemeral principles of freedom, to ‘play out’ and ‘own’ the streets & public places and to give thanks to those brave souls who have laid down their lives so we can live in peace and ‘freedom’ I think to be truly free we must first of all understand what it is to be oppressed and the darker side of the human condition.

Viva la Liberation!

Many thanks to Fools Paradise & Kate & Alex of  The Guernsey Events Company Ltd for making it happen.

Workshop by UrbanCanvas