The Marvellous Dream
‘The Marvellous Dream’, 44x64cm, Ink on paper, 2024. Framed 58x78cm.
The Marvellous Dream: Power. Tradition. Landscape. Folklore. The calendar and the seasons.
This work is about a lot of different things and I may never be able to fully explain what it means because it distils years of ideas. The catalyst for the work can be accurately described as Hastings’ Jack in the Green festival, around May Day 2023. My attendance at that event certainly spurred me on towards this drawing, indeed some of the participants are represented in this piece, but the composition fell into place later in the year after a struggle to articulate what I wanted to say.
What I can say is that a major part of the themes I have represented relate to the central power disparity between the gargantuan polar bear and the children dancing for or around him. It’s an aspect of folk festivals with a very deep history but one that feels extremely uneasy to me. The bear is represented at roughly true size to accentuate (or exaggerate?) the power that the children, all female, might lack. The masks represent that history, and assumptions about power that we all too easily internalise. In this scene losing the mask pulls you into the dance and loses the innocence. The bear might devour you or discard you, twirling you over the cliff edge - you have absolutely no say whatsoever when faced with such overwhelming power. You might as well be the tiny porcelain ballerina in a music box, an entertaining toy. Power, memory, ritual.