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Living Art at Taurus Crafts |
All artists shown below have in their own way engaged in a
dance between the human spirit and the forces of nature to create a unique piece
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Phil Bews |
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This is the second bull that Phil has built at Taurus Crafts. The first was of a temporary nature and met its pre-destined end in a wave of controversy. Phil has a local, and indeed national, reputation for creating and choreographing spectacular Fire Sculpture events. And his first bull was sacrificed in the service of just such a magical performance. Indeed, it was the protests at the burning of this bull that gave rise to the creation of the permanent bull sculpture. |
David England |
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Hailing from Herefordshire, David England has a long relationship with Taurus Crafts through its association with the Camphill Village Trust. David’s children attend the Rudolf Steiner School in Hereford, and it was here that he was first recommended to approach Taurus as a possible outlet for his Handmade Greeting Cards. |
Jill Fanshawe Kato |
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Another close link to Japan was maintained when Jill Fanshawe Kato became Artist in Residence at Taurus at the same time that David’s Haiku Perch was being carved and his exhibition of carved stone works (called WALKING STONE GARDEN) was in full swing in the courtyard. Jill had originally been contacted as part of the Japan 2001 promotion, organised by the Japanese Embassy, but was unable to take part due to her exhibition commitments in Tokyo, where she exhibits and sells much of her work. (However we did have the very great pleasure of hosting several talks and workshops by world-renowned potter, Professor Takeshi Yasuda, during November 2001 as part of our Japan 2001events). |
Helen Schell |
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One of the most ambitious ‘Living Artworks’ to date at Taurus Crafts is sited in what was formerly the low walled garden of the original Lydney Park Estate House. This grand house once stood not on the hill overlooking Taurus Crafts, but in the present position of the Model Village. Taurus Crafts now occupies what used to be the coach house, farm buildings and yard attached to the original building. The low walled area, between Nutkin’s Nursery and the Taurus Crafts Coach House, was originally destined to be a traditional garden. A brick-lined concrete path was laid in 1998 as a project involving young adults benefiting from one of the Taurus Crafts’ work experience and training projects. A large millstone was also sited in the garden, which was otherwise all grass. |
Ken & Rachel Stanway |
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On the opposite side of the road to the Wonder Pod,
alongside the Restaurant, stands a ‘Living Artwork’ that contrasts strongly
to the Wonder Pod in both size and complexity. It could almost be described
as a minimalist piece of Living Art. The Winter Flowering Spring was
designed by Ken Stanway as part of his and daughter Rachael’s residency in
December 2001. The theme set for this Christmas period was ‘wrapping’ and
there followed an intensive month-long programme of interactive activities,
culminating in the ‘unveiling’ of the metal-wrapped winter flowering shrub.
This dynamic duo dubbed this period an ‘Action Packed Evolving Exhibition of
Wrapped and Unwrapped Art’, and virtually everything in sight became
wrapped. Most noticeably they enveloped the Taurus Bull in the white
material used to make tea bags (kindly donated by near neighbours J R Crompton Ltd). |
Molly Meager |
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Mollie is an architectural glass artist working with light and colour. She used her time here to explore the fascinating and varied qualities of glass. In particular, she focussed on its capacity to reflect (whilst remaining invisible) and its usefulness for changing the perspective of the world beyond. |
Phil Cooper |
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Paul has won Gold, Silver and Bronze medals for his garden designs at the Chelsea Flower Show, and the Fiskar’s Sword of Excellence for the best garden at Chelsea entitled ‘The Greening of Industry’. He was filmed making four episodes of gardening programmes for HTV during his residency at Taurus. The programmes featured his innovative ‘floating gardens’, his ideas for decorating shrubs out of season and plant containers inspired by the compression techniques used in the Heavy Metal Garden. His book ‘Living Sculpture’, which was launched soon after his stay here at Taurus, features ideas from around the world for using plants to provide sculptural elements within a landscape. |
Tom Cusines |
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Since giving up a career as a lecturer in sculpture at University of Lancaster, Paul Cooper has gone on to become a leading contemporary garden designer and the author of two influential and thought-provoking books, which have made quite an impact within the garden design establishment. Another artist in residence at Taurus also sought to challenge the establishment using completely different methods. What was conceived as an environmental issue-based artwork called ‘Saving Jorvik’ eventually materialised as Power of the People, a month long ‘action’ by local environmental artist Tom Cousins with the technical support of green energy technical advisor Frank Jackson. |
Richard Box |
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Richard’s work typically exhibits a fusion of science, art and nature and during his residency at Taurus in December 2002 he explored ways of harnessing the wind coming across the flood plain of the River Severn. In the same way he had used discarded fluorescent tubes at Bristol, at Taurus he planned to use discarded satellite dishes to produce outdoor kinetic light sculptures. These would appear as luminous objects, which by their movement suggests floating pulsating spheres of light. |
Jerry Ortmans |
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Formerly a commercial printer, Jerry spent two and a half years at the printing department of ‘War on Want’. Here he was struck by the gap between the high motivation of those working for the charity and the ‘contemptuous’ world of product ‘development’ and the resulting promotional schemes in the commercial sector. The incredibly sophisticated engineering technology employed in industry seemed to him only as useful as the products produced. He became a joiner and builder making roofs, windows, doors and stairs, with which it is hard to find fault, since they have such universal importance. |
Steve Hyslop |
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Moving to the Forest in the same year as Taurus opened on the Old Park site, Steve quickly gained a reputation for his expressive woodcuts. He ran many workshops for local children as a way of earning a living whilst developing the expertise required for this challenging medium. His first exhibition at Taurus was in 1997 and some of the earliest photographs taken in the Restaurant show his works exhibited on the walls. |
Fritz Gerstandt |
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Back in 1995, Fritz, a good friend of Dirk Rohwedder, accepted his invitation to come to England and paint The Minoan Friezes which now add beauty and life to the Restaurant Servery, Food Preparation Area and Shop. Indeed his task was to fill every room in the former coach house of the Lydney Park with colourful ornamentation. In just 4 weeks he created all the interior decorations on the theme of the Minoan culture, an apt choice for a friend developing a new social enterprise in the field of arts and crafts. Today the works, depicting mythical creatures and a glorious procession of artists and craftspeople still provide a daily uplifting reminder of the essential nature of Taurus Crafts. Indeed Fritz painted the picture of the bull, with acrobats gaily and confidently cavorting over it, in praise of the Minoan’s freedom of spirit in art. |
Ian Richardson |
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His Möbius Strip currently stands outside what was the original entrance to the Taurus Crafts Gift shop. Its relative discomfort in this position is explained by the fact that it was originally designed for a completely different location. It is on generous and permanent loan to Taurus from Mrs Haskew of Newnham on Severn and will be re-sited when the next development of Taurus takes place. Mark Haskew, her husband, commissioned Ian to produce a sculpture for their garden. The work was designed to break the line of the roof of the house when viewed from the garden, and yet maintain the view to the River Severn from the house. |
Ron Boyd |
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Since leaving the Royal College of Arts in the 1970’s Ron had confined himself to working in oils on canvas, developing a reputation as one of the Forest of Dean’s finest landscape painters. Here was a new departure and a new challenge. This would be Ron’s first public artwork. |
David Yates |
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David studied at the Royal Forest of Dean College (Fine Art) and at the West Wales School of Art, he was awarded a B.A. Hons. in Art & Design, specialising in Sculpture. He has lived all over the world, an experienced traveller, this has given David a breadth of understanding and cosmopolitan approach to life which he combines in his sculpture. |