Large wooden outdoor sculptures at Lake Vyrnwy and Bala in Wales

 On a recent trip to Wales, I visited Lake Vyrnwy. The lake is actually a reservoir, with a stone dam built in the 1880s holding back the waters...

 and a very striking Gothic-revival 'straining tower', which filters the waters before they are pumped off to supply Liverpool and Merseyside.

The area around the reservoir is now a bird reserve, partly managed by the RSPB. At one end of the lake, overlooked by the dam,  is an interesting sculpture trail showing large wooden artworks by artists from around the world.

Here's one called 'Water is life' by Angela Polglaze from Australia:

 

I also liked this more abstract form; 'Obelisk' by the Norwegian artist Nils Haukeland

 

...as well as 'The Ark of Llanwddyn' by the Welsh artist Irene Brown (Llanwddyn is the name of the village submerged by the waters when the reservoir was built)

 

...and 'Cupboard' by Rosemary Terry, also from Wales.

Some of the sculptures are showing signs of the deterioration that you would expect after twelve or more years of Welsh weather acting on them, but many were still in pretty good shape.

After looking around, we went off to find the tallest tree in England and Wales, which was marked as growing on the side of the lake. We were four years too late! The Douglas fir, which was once 63.7m (208.9ft) high, was badly damaged in a storm and had to be felled. However, the chainsaw carver Simon O'Rourke has sculpted the remaining 50-foot stump into a huge reaching hand, which is situated in a beautiful spot near a small waterfall.

On the other side of the lake were more huge wooden artworks. These picnic benches are huge! They were the scene for a highlight of the trip; feeding chaffinches peanuts from my hand.

Simon O'Rourke also carved some very nice sculptures at the camping site that we stayed at;
Pen y bont, on the outskirts of the small town of Bala. They represent figures from the ancient Welsh tales called the Mabinogion. Apparently he carved them all (the image below shows about half the total number) in about 5 days.

This is Taliesin, the poet and seer:

 

This is the giant Tegid Foel, who was supposed to have lived on an island in the middle of Lake Bala (which is called Llyn Tegid in Welsh):

This is Blodeuedd, who was created from the flowers of meadowsweet, broom and oak by Math and the sorceror Gwydion:

A day in Leigh Woods; Burwalls cave, Luke Jerram's stranded boats and a wooden sofa

Leigh Woods runs along one side of the Avon Gorge near Bristol and is home to some very rare species of trees and plants. I went there a few days ago with a friend of mine, Duncan.

First we visited the legendary Burwalls Cave. This cave is quite a scramble to get to, but it's worth it. When we went, the ramsons (also called wild garlic) were covering the woodland floor, giving the mild garlicky smell that always means 'summer is coming' to me.

The cave itself is just under where Burwalls House now sits at one end of the Clifton Suspension Bridge. Before the mansion and the bridge were built, there was an Iron Age hill fort there.

Although some of the cave looks natural, I'm sure that other parts were dug out, built up and remodelled to make the place more like a grotto when such things were fashionable. The Bristol area has a couple of other notable grottoes, including ones at Goldney House and Warmley. 

Unfortunately, the cave was a mess when we arrived, with old sleeping bags and rubbish all over the place.  There were no signs of any current occupants either.

 

We couldn't really leave it in such a state, so we bagged up the rubbish and piled away the camping gear (being very watchful for discarded needles, of which there didn't seem to be any luckily). It was a real shame to see such a great spot, that many people have enjoyed finding for the first time, left full of discarded junk. Often before there has been cooking equipment and similar useful items left there tidily for other visitors to use, but this was different.

It looked a lot better afterwards, and in one dark corner we were rewarded by coming across a roosting bat. We also let the rangers, who look after the cave, know what was there. Hopefully it will be in a more welcoming state now.

 

After a bit of a mad scramble to get back to the parapet of the Suspension Bridge, we walked up into Leigh Woods. It was good to be there again, especially at this time of year when everything is gearing into summer.  The visit also gave an opportunity to visit the Centenary Bench and see how it was doing, as well as getting some knife carving done.

 

Two of the National Trust rangers at Leigh Woods have carved a great-looking wooden sofa, from cedar which originally grew on the Tyntesfield estate.  It is where the car park used to be by the Trust's offices :

 

There was another new artwork to be visited in the trees nearby. Luke Jerram is a well-known artist and has made installation artworks around Bristol before. He has placed five fishing boats in the woods as a piece called 'Withdrawn'. It addresses the problem of overfishing and its effects on the environment.

It was interesting to see, although it was a shame that the boats weren't safe to climb onto. Even though it wasn't the point behind the artwork, some of Jerram's previous installation pieces have involved a lot of viewer participation (playing pianos left around the city or sliding down a huge water slide) and it made just standing and looking at the boats feel a bit like there was more that could be happening.  

 

The walk there was lovely though, with the bluebells in the hazel coppices starting to come into flower. I'm glad that the artwork is there and that it gives people who might not be visiting the woods otherwise a reason to see them when they're at (what I would consider) their most beautiful.

Brading, a historic town in the Isle of Wight. Carvings done with power tools. Punishment, torture and the secret of hewing timbers.

This town is on the eastern side of the island and is proud of its long history. It has a few surprising things still to be seen...

Much of the town was involved in smuggling at some point and with this background of illegal activities, it seems appropriate that the whipping post and stocks have been preserved in the Old Town Hall next to the twelfth- century church. The stocks are thought to date to the seventeenth or eighteenth century but there are records of stocks being used here in 1555 and the whipping post was last used in 1833. Why have the stocks got five holes? No one really knows, but one suggestion is that they were specially made to accommodate a regular offender who only had one leg!

At the other end of the street is a metal ring set into the ground. It is a bull ring, to which bulls were tied before being attacked by dogs and then slaughtered. This revolting 'sport' was justified by the belief that this made the meat better. It was thankfully stopped here in 1820.

Next to the ring is a sculpture of a bull which was made by Paul Sivell, a carver based on the island who specialises in using power tools:

He has also carved another sculpture to be seen by the car park next to the church.

Next to the old Town hall and the church is a very interesting building: the Rectory mansion, possibly the oldest building on the island. It lies on Roman foundations but was built in 1228 and some think that timbers from a previous Anglo-Saxon building on the spot were reused in its structure.

The building has a rather fine ship's figurehead on its corner, but I haven't been able to find out the story behind it.

Seeing some of the timbers that have been used in the Rectory house reminded me of chatting to my friend Nigel recently about timbers that he had found whilst renovating a seventeenth century building in Bristol.

(see here: http://carvingswithstories.blogspot.co.uk/2012/12/recycling-in-17th-century-bristol.html)

Nigel said that when restoring an original doorway in the building, he noticed that only the sides that were facing outwards (and were therefore on show) were cut square. The other faces were left waney edged, as they had come from the tree but with the bark removed. They were hidden, facing into the wall.

Which makes a lot of sense. Hewing timber or sawing by hand to make it square are both long, hard and skilled processes, so why do it on the faces of timbers that don't need it? If there are no joints that require a flat surface to work, then don't bother cutting one. Some of the timbers in the Rectory mansion might also show evidence of this way of thinking.

As does this timber from Baddesley Clinton in Warwickshire:

Not lazy, just smart thinking!