The Tale of Winnall Moors

Water Voles

These are high-profile on Winnall Moors where numbers are increasing. This is the opposite to the rest of the country where they are declining.

The sculpture project is moving forward now and community groups and schools have been identified to work with. A central story to the trail is a key aspect and a company called Orangeapples have been identied to deliver story telling workshops in local schools. A schedule for this is my next task.

These cut-out animals will form an ongoing part of this blog. They will eventually be to illustrate the charecters within ‘The Tale of Winnall Moors’. These painted animals can be used to illustrate a booklet printed especially to accompany the trail. I am hoping Orangeapples can also use them to develop the story in the storey telling workshops.

slide show of water voles in the recent snowy conditions.

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My second walk around the Moors

27 Jan

The second walk seemed more about photography, I talked to a guy who took pictures on most days it seemed. He showed me a photo of a swan with four wings! Which was an optical illusion with two swans. Swans had hissed at me earlier in the day as well.

: Winnall Moors in the late afternoon

He was, or had been taking photos, I always will take photos when I visit. So this post is really about conveying thoughts along the walk. In truth I did not have very many, just walking sucks your thoughts out of your head and you just slip off into a Walter Mitty Land, where you can’t remember your thoughts.

I dont remember having many thoughts the landscape sucks your thoughts away

The reality is, I need to put together a group of working partners for the delivery of this project and I am in the process of contacting groups and meeting people to begin involvement on the project.

So far then:

Contact with the Winnall Community Centre , St Bedes Primary, one student from Winchester school of Art, admin and office staff at Winnall Primary School (sadley the no contact with teaching staff yet) and a storey telling group called Orangeapples. See their website here.

I like these stumps and wonder if they will start prouting twigs in the spring.

I am actually looking forward to meeting my new working partners and excited about the storey telling aspect to this project. This will take me into areas I wont have really worked in before. Thinking my thoughts into animals, I know that is nonsence, but that is what I am doing…..talking birds……fairy tales……animal masks………..and a storey that has an extra section on the end, that is sometimes there and sometimes not according to weather the cows are there or not?

: They hissed at me and swan about like they own the place

So on my last post I ended with pictures of painted Kingfishers, this time they are real swans.

Tags: winchester school of art

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An Early Morning Walk

15 Dec

An early morning walk, thinking about a story-based sculpture trail. It was frosty and the sun was out. I had joggers pass me on the braodwalks with their head-phones in and saw a guy photographing wild life. He said that he had’nt seen anything unusual yet, just ducks and a coote.

wildlife habitats - magic swans - keepers of the river

thinking of a storey

'rolling in the deep'

So this is the first of what will probably turn out to be many walks on Winnal Moors. I am looking forward to watching the landscape change through the seasons. In the mean time I’m thinking of fairy tales and talking birds?