The Xaidreadian Notebook

day dress, 1893 by unknown designer

this dress is made of silk, wool, velvet and lace. There is a definite influence of aesthetic dress on this dress, in the William Morris-esque pattern

Soon Young Warren (Korea b.1960)

White Daisy with Turquoise (2023)

Fire Eel (Mastacembelus erythrotaenia), family Mastacembelidae, order Synbranchiformes, found in freshwater habitats in SE Asia

This species is not a “true eel”, but is in a group called the spiny eels.

maquet also put the collaborations on his tombstone!

Rabbie Burns RPF programme summary [72min]:

Towards the end of his life, on a farm in Dumfries, Robert Burns begins to write a poem that will become one of his famous works.

This was on last year's Burns Night programming. (Not currently available - sorry!) Programme summary [56min]:

Robert Burns’s narrative poem mischievously reimagined for a contemporary audience by Gary McNair.

Tam has something of a thirst for alcohol. His wife’s warned him of the trouble he’s likely to get in if he doesn’t change his ways. Does Tam listen? No. But he’s about to face the night of his life, when her prophesy becomes reality…

First broadcast on BBC Radio Scotland in January 2019. Programme summary [26min]:

Novelist Louise Welsh explores the unlikeliest best friends in Scottish letters: Robert Burns and Frances Dunlop.

In 1786, Mrs Frances Anna Wallace Dunlop a 56-year-old mother, grandmother and woman of letters, started a correspondence with a poet half her age: Robert Burns.

She was a gentlewoman proud of her family’s connection to William Wallace. He was the son of a tenant farmer. It shouldn’t have worked to have a friendship that crossed barriers of age, sex and class like that - and yet she was one of the most important people in Burns’ life.

Thanks to new research by Moira Hansen of Glasgow University, we’re understanding more about this relationship and the foundation of shared experience it was built upon.

Burns’ poetry helped Frances recover from a deep depression and she in turn became the person he reached out to most when he was troubled in mind.

Novelist Louise Welsh joins Moira and Burns expert Professor Gerald Carruthers to explore the relationship, while finding out about Burns' mental health from Professor Daniel Smith.

Historian of emotions, Dr Katie Barclay tells us more about how 18th-century people thought about depression and modern day writer Dr Carolyn Jess Cooke considers the healing power of writing letters.

excerpt:

Burns is thought to have planted the trees, which were identified by heritage forester Andrew Brown, when he altered a watercourse as part of his agricultural improvements to the land.

A comparison of two detailed estate maps suggested Burns's involvement in the planting of the beech trees.

The first, drawn in 1787, a year before Burns moved in, shows no trees in the location, while the second, drawn in 1817, clearly shows them in place.

The trees now stand on the spoil bank above the Laggan Burn, a watercourse Burns is documented as having dug out.

Some still have graffiti carved into their trunks dating to the 1890s, by which time they would have already grown significantly.

Written records from Burns's time at Ellisland refer both to the ditching of the burn and to tree planting on the farm.

The trust is now set to apply to Dumfries and Galloway Council for a Tree Preservation Order, recognising the trees' historical association with the poet.

[…]

Burns lived at the farmhouse for three years and researchers now believe more of the poet's original features remain intact than had previously thought to be the case.

Original floorboards, ironmongery, windows, wall presses and a neoclassical wooden mantelpiece were all found.

I say this as someone who sells pottery, and many people who see my art assume I am using art as an outlet to “express myself.”

I am not.

I use art to challenge myself. A lot of what I do is the equivalent of doing a hard sudoko or a half marathon, answering the question of “can I do this?”

I use art to question things and explore ideas. Finding physical synthesis between concepts and working out a design to its end state.

I use art to make money. I make some things just because I suspect they’ll sell well, and I keep making them when they do.

This idea that an artist is “putting themselves out there” every time they create is not only stupid, but harmful, and it kills critique and analysis.

Yes every creative work is influenced by its creator, but the most preliminary step of analysis is to define the purpose of a work of art (functional, narrative, entertainment, persuasive, decorative, ceremonial, etc.) and a vanishingly small percentage of that is self-expression. Even then, it’s generally tied to the self’s relationship with something else—perception, society, etc.

It’s very tiresome to have people assume they know you because they like (or dislike) your art, to make assumptions about who you are and how you approach the world. It’s nothing new— people called the Impressionists insane and the Fauvists degenerate. And now people are expected to hand out their identities and traumas to prove they have the right to explore certain subjects.