Looking back and moving forward

I've been in a bit of hibernation this summer and I've had a break in doing any blogging so this post comes some time after our last workshop. 

So, Brenda Ann Kenneally came to stay at the yurts. Brenda + a yurt + the cold + Rufus and a load of photographers staying on a farm for a week. It was inspiring, stressful, tiring, but ultimately as always a fantastic experience. Brenda was a bright spark at a difficult time and I hope I know her for a very long time to come.

We also met some other very nice photographers who made it all the way down to Devon, including David Hurn from Magnum, Matt Cardy from Getty and Jocelyn Bain Hogg from VII. David Hurn had the best end to a talk I have ever heard, was extremely cool AND I got a cuddle from him.

Lessons have been learnt from organising The Hinterlands over the past two years. We've made mistakes, had fun, learnt a lot, grown up a bit and became a team when it mattered most - despite our difficulties and differences.

Thanks to everyone who came to the Hinterlands this summer and supported the workshops online and in person, making each week a unique experience.

Old Cob Wall by C.Fox Smith

I popped in to see John Tizehurst the other day (he plays the accordion in my photofilm Memories of a house). I wanted to show him the pictures of him lighting the Jubilee Beacon from back in June. He's not been so well lately and I thought they might cheer him up. We had a lovely chat about this and that and as I was leaving he gave me a copy of this poem. Spoken in the old Devon way it sounds really lovely.

Old cob wall

    Have fell at last:

Us knowed he might

    A good while past.

Great-grandad he

   Built thicky wall

With maiden earth

   And oaten strawl

He built en in

   The good old way.

And there he've stood

   Until today

But wind and rain

   And frost and snow

Have all combined

   To lay en low.

Us propped en up

   With stones and 'ood

Us done our best,

  But tweren't no good.

He gived a bit

  And then a lot,

And at the finish

  Down he squat.

And now, since barns

  Has got to be,

Us'll build another

'Stead of he.

But not the same

  He was afore,

'Cos no one builds

  Cob walls no more.