Shell Covered Miniature Books.

After the experimental shell covered books that I made in Cornwall, I couldn't wait to visit our beaches here in Eastbourne to find shells for some further trials

There are plenty of these very sea worn shells mixed in with the pebbly beaches here,, so it was just a case of trying to find pairs that were a similar size and shape.

I don't have a suitable drill for making holes in the shells, so I have made a sort of fabric hinge to join the two halves together, and then I was able to stitch the paper pages into the hinge.

There are only about six pages in each tiny book, and apart from one, I have used watercolour paper, which I'm hoping to paint/draw into at some point. The 3rd image down shows pages cut from some painted/decorated papers that I already had.

The back of each book shows the hinge, and where the thread holding the pages in place has been stitched through to the outside, I have used some tiny wooden beads to decorate. Not sure where this idea is going yet, but it is always fun to come up with a new idea, and to play around with it, just to see where it might lead!

Brison's Veor, final post.

This last post is showing a mixture of random photos, including the sea and landscapes of Cape Cornwall, and the area around Priest's Cove. Also some sketchbook pages, and images from Tate St. Ives.

We visited the Kurt Jackson Foundation Gallery in st. Just, where we saw his exhibition 'Sea Crows'., and another by artist Denzil Forrester. Kurt Jackson lives in St. Just, and most of the work in this current exhibition has been inspired by the Shags and Cormorants that inhabit Cape Cornwall. His work is full of energy, and seems to capture the light and moods of the area, I absolutely loved it all.

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A steep climb up to the coastguard, and an even higher climb to the chimney from one of the tin mines to be found here.

The setting sun reflecting a pink glow on the white cottages, and opportunist gulls following a fishing boat

We did see a pod of dolphins one evening, but unfortunately I didn't have my camera handy at the time! However, I did just about manage to capture a shot of a sea lion, with a mouthful of his fishy supper, and two surfers paddling out to catch a wave.

Wonderful patterns and colours in the local granite and rocks.

We saw an exhibition by Patrick Heron in Tate St. Ives, and I particularly liked the piece below by Barbara Hepworth.

Just over the hill from where we were staying was this small ruin of the St. Helen's Oratory.

Random pages from my sketchbook.

Yet another from my collection of sunsets.

And finally, a 'selfie', from a reflection in the studio mirror. I hope these last 3 posts have given just a small flavour of our incredible week in this beautiful corner of Cornwall here in England.

Brisons Veor part 2, and a trip to St. Ives

Lots of these shells with their middles missing were scattered about the beach, so I decided that I needed to use them in some way to place in one or more of my containers. I had printed some fabric using seaweed and acrylic paint, and I decided that this would make a good fabric middle for the shell rims. I also felt that a little bit of hand stitch added to the tiny pieces of fabric would be fun.

Once stitched, and fitted into the shells, I played around with the idea of making them into tiny covers for tiny books!

It was extremely fiddly, but I managed to stick some narrow tape between the two shells, forming not only a hinge, but somewhere to stitch the tiny pages for the tiny books, As you can see, I also made a second book using two whole shells.

I have propped the two books back to back, for the purpose of this photo, as they are supporting each other.

After our day trip to St. Ives, where we not only visited Tate St. Ives, but also spent a wonderful hour or so in the Barbara Hepworth Museum and Sculpture Garden, I was inspired to play around with some Das air drying clay, which resulted in the two very, very small sculptures below.

Sculpture is the wrong word to use really, but I again incorporated a shell rim in the top image, fitting two smaller shells inside, and then the funny piece below, which has two holes, and has been decorated on the outside by dipping string in paint, and then pressing it into the surface.

I felt quite moved to see Barbara Hepworth's workshop, just as though she's popped out for a few minutes, and outside some large pieces of stone were just waiting for her to work her magic on.

So many wonderful pieces of her sculpture placed around the magical garden, but I have only included a small collection, mainly because it was very busy, with lots of visitors wandering along the paths, making it difficult to photograph without including strangers somewhere nearby!

Water features also give some wonderful reflections.

Always interesting to move around each piece, and to see how the view through the apertures changes as you travel.

The whole week was so full of inspiration, it is going to take me quite some time to digest it all, but hopefully it will also be supplying me with lots of ideas for future work. Part 3, and probably my final post about this trip will be coming up soon, so thanks for visiting yet again.