The first thing I need to do is offer my thanks to everyone who stopped by to see us, to everyone who hosted us, to everyone who fed us, to everyone who made this past weekend one the best I’ve ever had on this magical isle. While I’m naturally exhausted after a very nomadic four days, I also feel restored and even charged by the immense gift of magic that happens when one spends time with such magical people and in such incredible places.
The Day of the Dead Conference was stunning. That painting you see gracing the center of the shrine is by the extremely talented Stuart Littlejohn. I don’t normally take photographs of sacred spaces in use, but this was the focal point of the event and I think the ancestors were most pleased.
It is always good to catch up with those friends and colleagues we only ever see at these events, but for us this event topped all the others we’ve attended together as Hadean Press. The speakers, the sellers, the artists and authors, the publishers and the practitioners who gathered together to honour the ancestors on this day were amazing. As Alkistis of Scarlet Imprint said, the sense of community was phenomenal and Dis and I feel very privileged to be a part of it. A very special thanks goes out to Jamie and Jack of The Occult Consultancy, who made it happen. Those two work tirelessly to bring out the best in us all.
That was Saturday. On Sunday, we journeyed to Dartmoor.
(Photo from http://www.englandtravelpictures.com)
This is the place that has inspired some of my favorite authors and illustrators and yes, I have heard the pixies calling faintly for many years. I felt the greatest sense of awe as the high moorland appeared before us, shrouded in mist under a greying sky, with shades of green and brown as far as the eye could see. They say never to eat or drink in fairyland, but we did and it was delicious. And amazingly enough, none of the gold we brought back with us has turned to autumn leaves. Thank you so very much for a brilliant afternoon.
If you, too, would like a small taste of Dartmoor and its influence, I highly recommend Around the Table with…Alan Lee, part 1 and part 2 hosted on the fabulous site John Barleycorn Must Die.
Sunday night found us in fancy dress, with me doing my best impersonation of a dead maiden.
Photo © Chloe Wilson
Chloe Wilson is yet another fantastic artist we met in our travels and the owner of Dusty Attic Bears (and the bears’ creator!). The party was hosted by Nanageddon, and we stayed until the wee hours. I never saw so much absinthe in my life, but I behaved because I was still recovering from Friday night’s binge.
On Monday we had the day to ourselves. After a breakfast made mostly of coffee, we wandered the shops, stopping first at Covenstead’s Curious Cottage, “Purveyors of weird and wonderful things for strange and beautiful people…” I don’t think I’ve ever been so eager to spend so much money in one place. The shop and the Covenstead B&B (we’ll get to that) are both owned and managed by Tayfun and Adele Kilic-Clough, who do a remarkable job of making a person feel welcome and warm. Our thanks to them as well for two nights of utter bliss in the B&B.
Most of the items you see in the photo above were purchased at the Cottage, but you can also see gifts (the bottle of sloe vodka from Paolo Sammut and the large skull from Andrew Dixon — thank you both so much!) and other fine things picked up at Saint Martha’s Botanica (success soap and money candle), from Midian Books (tiny skulls), and a fabulous skull tin made by Annemarie. Other shops and crafters of note in Glastonbury are Bedlam Boutique and Funki Pixi, and of course the Cat and Cauldron (owned and managed by Liz Williams and Trevor Jones) where I found a copy of The Ladies Oracle by Cornelius Agrippa, “being an infallible prophet of the male sex”. Heh. To be honest I never realised Agrippa ever gave a thought to the ladies, but this little oracle was designed specifically to “see the ladies of the German court through the joys, hopes, and trials of love”. Here’s a write-up by Vikram Karve. I asked it what the world thinks of me and it said it thinks I am “not cruel”.
Photo © Chloe Wilson
On Monday night we went to the fancy dress contest at the George & Pilgrim, my favorite pub in the world. I was very unoriginally dressed as a witch. In the photo above, from left to right, you can see Jamie (also unoriginally dressed as a rootworker), myself and Adele. She and Tayfun truly should have won that contest.
We departed from Glastonbury on Tuesday morning, but the adventure didn’t end there. On the way home we stopped to visit with Lisa Tenzin-Dolma, who is not only an artist and an author, but also does incredible work with dogs. The photo on the main page of her website is of her and one of her wonderful dogs, Skye, he of the air-kisses and the beautiful eyes.
Photo © The Covenstead
Let me wrap this up now with this image of the dining room of the Covenstead, which is where we enjoyed breakfast for two glorious mornings in a row. Please do follow the link to the B&B’s website, where you can see even more of the weird and wonderful things that fill up this most lovely house. If ever you plan to spend a night in Glastonbury, we can’t recommend this place enough. Many thanks to Adele and Tayfun for making us feel at home. Here is a photo of the Covenstead itself.
Photo © The Covenstead
I’m now going to sign off from here and work on the update for the Hadean Press website (after I’ve had a sleepy), where I’ll talk about the beautiful books we brought back with us and the Day of the Dead Conference itself. Please excuse my wavering between US and UK spelling. I’m too tired to care.
Next week on erzaveria I’m going to start Studio Tuesday. Every Tuesday we’re going to have a look at what’s going on in the studio. I thought this would be a good way to keep track of myself during the frantic months to come, and also an interesting way to document a studio being dismantled and built back up again as we now begin the enormous project of packing everything up for France. See you then!
by Virginia
02 Nov 2011 at 19:12
I agree that you are not cruel.