Cardiff art: A celebration of mining

Wales and coal mining go together like bread and butter. In fact, coal mining was the bread and butter of many Welsh men for many a year, and none more so than in the Valleys north of Cardiff. From valleys and men stained black with its soot and dust, the black gold of coal flowed down the innumerable railway lines to the port of Cardiff and thence by ship to power industries in Britain and around the world.

It’s no surprise, then, to find that many of Cardiff’s public artworks pay tribute to the industry that put Cardiff on the world map and to the 250,000 men who slaved and sometimes died underground to extract the coal that powered that industry. Over time, though, the styles of the artworks have changed rather dramatically.

This first grouping sits outside the Edwardian-era Glamorgan Building, formerly Cardiff’s County Hall but now home to the Schools of Social Sciences, Planning and Geography within Cardiff University. Two groups of statues sit adjacent to the building’s main entrance, one group representing navigation and the other, shown here, coal mining. The statues were sculpted between 1908 and 1912 by Albert Hemstock Hodge (1875-1917), a Scottish artist who specialised in architectural sculptures like these, and were originally intended to go on the roof of the building. Maybe the Portland stone proved too heavy for that lofty perch!

Hodge’s style is reminiscent of Classical Greek sculpture though, to my eye, his work shows none of the grace and elegance of the Greeks. The work is allegorical: from the helmet she wears and the shield on her right arm, one of the two seated female figures can be identified as Minerva, Roman goddess of trade and industry. She appears to be receiving a gift of a basket of coal from the front male figure. To see the real miners in this group, though, you need to climb the entrance stairs and take a look at the back of the statue. Here, one man is straining to push a tram full of coal, while another uses his pick to help pull the heavy load.

Though rugged and well-muscled workers, these two don’t resemble any Welsh men I’ve ever seen! But then neither does the collier in this more recent artwork. 

As one critic commented ‘The statue looks more like a pumped-up male model than a raw-boned Welsh miner’.

Titled ‘From Pit to Port’, this bronze and wrought iron work was designed and partly constructed by John Clinch (1934-2001) but completed by Jon Buck after Clinch died. 

Unveiled in 2005, it stands alongside Roath Dock in Cardiff Bay, celebrating the connection between mining and the port from where the coal was shipped far and wide.

In the pink!

I haven’t blogged about my knitting projects before but there has to be a first time for everything, right? And I’m celebrating because ... finally ... FINALLY ... F.I.N.A.L.L.Y! ... I’ve finished a project that’s been on the go since January 2015.

I have actually completed three other projects in the meantime – a bulky jumper with cables, a simple scarf using up the rest of the bulky jumper wool, and another Fair Isle project, a sleeveless vest (which was my own design and one I’m rather proud of) – but this other just seemed to linger somehow.

It’s a jumper / sweater / jersey – whichever you prefer – and it’s one of my own Fair Isle designs (or, more correctly, I should say that it’s my own combination of traditional Fair Isle motifs knitted to my own colour choice). 

I started the project during the six months I lived in Cheshire in 2014-15 and even took the part-finished jumper and all the wool back to New Zealand in April 2015, thinking I would get it finished during the few months I was back there. It was the New Zealand winter after all.

But no! I was too busy selling my apartment, selling off my goods and chattels, and arranging to move my life to Britain to knit a single stitch. And then, when I left New Zealand, I went travelling for a few weeks and didn’t have the space to carry the part-jumper with me, so it had to go into the boxes with all my other belongings, to be seafreighted to Wales.

My worldly goods finally got delivered in mid-October 2015 and I recall enthusiastically extolling the virtues of knitting and including a photo of the part-jumper in a blog I wrote then, entitled ‘Ten things I love about autumn’ – one thing being that the autumn weather meant it was cool enough to knit comfortably.

Still, it lingered.... I was busy getting my new life here in Cardiff under way, walking and exploring a lot. I joined the Glamorgan Fungi Club and the Glamorgan Bird Club and the Ramblers so was out and about with them as well. And, at the beginning of the year, I started a new daily nature blog that took / takes quite a lot of time to produce. And then I started doing voluntary work two full days a week....

Excuses, excuses, excuses! Finally, in the middle of summer, I got my knitting mojo back. 

First, I knitted the sleeveless vest mentioned and shown above, and then I finally got back to my lovely Pinky jumper. I told myself I wasn’t allowed to start anything new until it was finished and I set a date of 31 August to get it done. And I did! 

So here it is. I absolutely love it and can’t wait for the colder weather so I can wear it. 

And, in the meantime, another sleeveless vest is underway. My knitting mojo is well and truly back!

It’s a sign: East Sussex

You know I just can’t resist a well-designed / interesting / lovely / intriguing / memorable / fascinating sign when I see one so, of course, I photographed a few during my recent short break in East Sussex. Here they are:

The Kings Head, Battle

The Kings Head is reputed to be the oldest pub in Battle but I don’t know if that’s actually true. The English Heritage website says it’s a Grade II-listed timber-framed building, dating from the 17th century or earlier, though it has at some point been modernised and had a new front attached. When researching this piece, I found a fascinating reference to documents, pertaining to the building, that are held at the East Sussex Record Office. 

The will of William Easton of Battle gent., dated 1783, proved PCC 1789, among other property devises a freehold messuage in Battle to John Longley the elder of Battle bricklayer and then to his son John ... In a mortgage of Nov 1810, the property is called Delveday ...

In Nov 1833, Ann Longley conveyed this property to her mother Mary ... who in Oct 1837 sold it to Thomas Wickham of Battle, miller for £650 ... The property passed to his daughter Elizabeth, wife of William Austin of Battle, victualler ... In June 1845, they sold the property, now known as the Kings Head Inn, for £735 to William Miskin of Broad Street, Horselydown, Surrey and others ... [and there is more]

The pub obviously has a long and interesting history. It also does reasonable food, as we discovered when we stopped off here for an early dinner on our way home from Rye Harbour.

The Cuckmere Inn, Cuckmere Haven

This was our lunch stop on the day we spent at the Seven Sisters Country Park, and a very pleasant one it was too. Conveniently situated at Exceat, on the road between Seaford and Eastbourne, and overlooking the Cuckmere River, the outdoor terraces proved a very pleasant place to eat and sparrow watch – a rather large flock has discovered the joys of human leftovers.

Though I haven’t been able to date the Inn, I imagine it is quite old. It is perfectly sited as a transfer point when the nearby beach at Cuckmere Haven was used by smugglers in the Middle Ages. The top part of the sign includes part of the coat of Arms of the nearby port of Seaford: the ‘lion-hulks’ (half lion half ship) appear in the heraldry of many of the Cinque Ports towns, and the eagle comes from the coat of arms of the d'Aquila family, former landowners in medieval times. The lower part of the sign shows the meandering Cuckmere River, and the motto ‘E ventis vires’ means ‘From the wind, strength’, a reference to the days of sailing ships.

The Cuckmere Inn used to be called the Golden Galleon, an allusion to Drake’s galleon the Golden Hind perhaps or to the Famous Five book? Who knows. I do know lunch was delicious!

Unstable ground

This sign appears at the start of the Seven Sisters cliff-top walk and other similar warning signs have been hammered into the ground all along the cliff tops. Unfortunately, the warnings are frequently ignored by walkers, who range perilously close to the cliff edges, as you can see from my photo. They’re mad! The chalk is crumbly and, with constant encouragement from wind and rain, large slices of cliff fall off on a regular basis.

The Ram, Firle

Another day, another scrumptious pub lunch. The Ram is in the tiny historic village of Firle and is part of the 500-year-old Firle Estate, owned by the Gage family. The inn is a Grade II-listed, brick and flint building that used to be a regular rest stop for the Lewes to Alfriston coach – that’s horse and coach, not motorised bus! The building was also once used as the village court room where the rents for tenant farmers were set and collected. Nowadays, it’s a popular lunch stop and also has boutique accommodation if you fancy a weekend away in a delightful setting.

Metal detecting prohibited

After our lunch at the Ram in Firle, we drove to the top of the hills above and walked a few miles of the South Downs Way. This sign hung on a gate into farmland at the beginning of our walk. In case you can’t quite make it out the sign reads: ‘Firle Estate. METAL DETECTING ON THIS LAND IS A CRIMINAL OFFENCE. To Report an incident Please Call the Estate Office on xxx or Sussex Police on xxx.’ It’s the first time I’ve seen anything like this but, as the hilltops are dotted with ancient Bronze Age barrows and Neolithic earthworks, I can certainly understand the prohibition on amateur metal detecting.