Krasa

KRASA ~ a name made from the Slavic roots of words for beautiful, the colour red, delight, fiery, alive, dazzling... (and which possibly ever so slightly brings to mind a certain anarcho-punk band?!). 

This is the new little trio that I'm playing in (and our business card, which I've just designed). You might find us these days on Devon street corners in red outfits busking for coins in the cold December sun. We'll be performing alongside esteemed musical comrades at the Feast of Fools, of course, but you can come and see us play for free next Thursday December 13th at the Sandy Park Inn, from 7.30pm. 

Here we are playing at a party last week... we all look rather serious and engrossed in getting the notes right, and there are people talking in the background (about accordions and morris minors and drinking too much, amongst other things!), but it gives you a taste.

These are two Klezmer tunes: Freilechs noch der Khupe & Papirossen.

Lisa Rowe is on fiddle, Tim Heming is on clarinet and bass, and that's me on accordion. Thanks to Pete Montanez for the video.

I'm still battling the excruciating performance nerves; it's a strange combination of wholeheartedly loving and wanting to play this music and simultaneously finding doing it in front of people terrifying. Strangely this is only when it's an "official" gig - I feel quite at home playing round a fire and thoroughly enjoy busking; perhaps I shall always remain a vagabond. But I forge on through the fear nonetheless, so come along to the pub and cheer us on if you're free next Thursday and live nearby.

Red & Gold

THE LAST GOLDEN LEAVES cling quivering to the trees' black November-bitten fingertips; whether they hang suspended far off in the quiet Dartmoor fogs that have moved over these hills lately, or are edged by the crisp bright low light of autumn, they are beautiful. 

But Oh! I have so much to do! This blog is overdue many tales of things done in the days gone before, that continue to go before at an astounding rate, but for now I must tell you of preparations for Yuletide, music, greetings cards, fairs and suchlike...

In a fit of un-Rima-like organisation, I began painting my yearly winter painting a while ago now. And it was to double as a poster for a Yule gig we are planning, which I shall tell you about in a few paragraphs' time.

This is called Feast of Fools, remembering the old tradition of Misrule in the middle of winter - the festival of turning things on their heads, making fools into kings for a day, and servants into masters. 

Here a motley crew in their fools' caps make their way to a gathering in a winter village. They travel there ridiculously of course: some try to sail their ship of fools across the snow, one carries his ass in a cart. Around the fire, bagpipe music is serenading the foolish antics of the red-and-yellow jesters there, and above it all, even the moon behaves like a loon.

I painted this in oils on canvas board as an experiment in painting on a different surface. This meant using the paint in a much more impasto way that I am used to, and also gave the final piece a background weave, which I quite like.

Feast of Fools
oils on canvas board
© Rima Staines 2012
prints available here

And so to the actual Feast of Fools...

My friend Suzi Crockford and I are organising a tremendous gathering of music and storytelling for a rollick of Yuletide cheer in the Chagford Jubilee Hall two days before Christmas (and two days after the end of the world!). There'll be our esteemed friends from Oxford Telling the Bees with their simply beautiful darkly crafted psychedelic folk music, as well as local apocalyptic bluegrass quartet The Kestor String Band with their superb purple moorgrass music, and my own trio Krasa - that's Lisa Rowe on fiddle/accordion, Tim Heming on clarinet/bass and me on accordion/flute - we'll be throwing some stonking Klezmer, Balkan and Eastern European tunes into the pot.

As well as all that, the ever-talented Tom Hirons will tell us strange tales of folly and wisdom, and be our be master of ceremonies for the night.

There'll be local ale and cider, mulled wine and mince pies, and an abundance of warmth, and festive foolery.

Here's the painting transformed into a flyer. If this fiery festive concoction tempts you, you can buy tickets locally at Sally's Newsagents in Chagford square, or else online here. Do come: it'll be marvellous! Here's the facebook event page.

Next in the catalogue of wonderful things... I have new greetings cards for sale!

Last year, I made a tidy loss on my winter cards due to my decidedly unmathematical brain, so this year, Tom has been helping me enormously by dealing with the unfathomable numbers aspect of my business. Also, I have been a good deal more organised and made a big print order of greetings cards. These are not just Yule cards - they can be sent any time of the year... I have cards for births, cards for old age, cards for weddings, cards for transformations, cards for trials, cards for journeys, cards for celebrations, as well as plenty of wintry cards too.  They're all blank inside for your own message.

I'm exceedingly proud to announce that they are all printed with vegetable-based inks on 100% recycled card by a worker-owned cooperative. 

I'm selling them singly, so that you can pick and choose the designs and amounts you like. They sold fast last year, so grab them now, before they're all gone!

This Saturday 24th November, I'll be selling these cards, along with my prints, framed with handmade reclaimed wooden frames at the excellent South Devon Steiner School Advent Fair, in Dartington. Last year this was more like a mini-festival than a school fair - with chai tents and stone-baked pizzas, pole-lathes and outdoor forges, not to mention the plethora of truly excellent craft and art; it's worth a visit if you're around on Saturday.

That evening I also have a gig with Krasa at a party in another Devon village, which I'm practising madly for, and quite nervous about - our only performance together so far has been busking, so this and the Feast of Fools will be our winter debuts as a proper band!

If you're Devon based and can't make the fair on Saturday, I'll also have a stall in Chagford's Endacott House at a small craft fair on December 15th. And there are always framed archival giclée prints and smaller works of mine available at Chagford's Artisan Gallery too, should you be searching these South-Western lanes for gifts this winter. 

In the gaps between my mad days of finishing commissions, beginning new ones, preparing for fairs and practising the accordion, I have snuck out with Macha for walks down the auburn-fringed lanes around our house. 

One evening took us sniffing and squelching along glinting yellow hedgerows and down the hill...

The hedge-leaves and Macha's fur were all picked out in gold, like the pages of a very precious book.

We found an open gate, and ran, arms-wide into the steep green field which overlooked the nearby hamlets, hills and moor beyond...

And then we walked on, further downhill...

The mossy middle of the lane was carved in a beautiful khaki evening light, and the shadows were long...

Toward the bottom of the hill, we could see an intriguing shape in the field ahead...

This is Spinster's Rock - a neolithic dolmen, just round the corner from our house!

It stands in a farmer's field, and is often used as a rain shelter by sheep. There are varying legends about three spinsters (i.e. women who spin wool, rather than single ladies) and how they erected the stones, or else became them. It feels perfectly safe to sit inside, (despite the precarious-looking granite capstone) and watch the last long sun rays sweep the tops of the trees.

On the edge of this field, there's a beautiful beech tree, grown over long years into the wall, crowned with fire.

On the way back up the hill, we spy soft-breathing neighbours through the hedge, caught in the mauve light of near dusk ...

And the sun sets behind us, silhouetting Kestor on the skyline, and the wide wild expanse of our Dartmoor.

Announcements like the petals on daisies

THE SUN HAS COME BACK! As it blinds us beautifully, glinting fondly remembered through high hedgerows and bouncing its spectrums from spider threads, we rejoice. But, alas we cannot bask in it - we're packing up the van for a long trip north tomorrow. Our road will take us to Scotland, and I don't know whether this longed-for sun has got as far up as that. We'll be travelling almost as far north as it's possible to go - to the Isle of Lewis, which I'm very excited about - I've never been to those islands off the west coast, up in the high north seas, where the edge of the land is a jagged archipelago. 

So, in the midst of doing last minute rehearsals and writing many Lists of Things To Take on the backs of envelopes, I'm popping in here to tell you about our storytellings, and make a few other announcements, before we dash off.

We'll be doing four tellings of Ivashko Medvedko - Little Ivan, Bear Child - the unparalleled Russian Folktale comprising a very strong man, a clever maiden, three giants, underworld journeys and, of course, the Baba Yaga herself. Tom will tell the story, which I will illustrate with accordion and shadow; I'll have a little exhibition/stall at each place where you'll be able to buy prints and paintings, too. Here are the date and times and places and ticket information:

Friday July 27th, 7.30pm - Old Well Theatre, Moffat.

Tickets - £7 - available at the 'Present Time' gift shop, 2/3 High St, Moffat, or from the theatre. Here's a map.

Saturday July 28th, 3pm - Elshieshields Tower, Lochmaben.

Tickets - £5 – call 01387 811 470. Here's a map.

Wednesday August 1st, 7pm-10pm - Galgael Trust, Govan, Glasgow.

with special guest: Bulgarian singer Viara Ivanova.

Tickets - £6/£4 - available online here or on the door. Here's a map.

All proceeds in aid of the Galgael Trust.

Event pages here and here.

Saturday August 4th - Isle of Lewis.

Please contact Sharon Blackie of Two Ravens Press and Earthlines Magazine for more info: info [AT] earthlines.org.uk

Tom has written a lowdown of our trip here. In fact, whilst you're there at his new blog, you'd do well to read some of his stunningly moving poetry and stories of bears...

It's all a combination of exciting and terrifying. Will anyone come? Will we be strangled by nerves or fly with the story? 

I urge and entice all of you who live in Scotland or know those who do to buy tickets and spread the word. Each venue will have a quite different feel to it, so choose whichever draws you.

In between, we'll be visiting old haunts, meeting friends and exploring the wilds of our north. Lewis is almost on a level with the bottom tip of Greenland, when you look at a map - I forget how northerly this little island of ours is.

~ ~ ~

And what else? Well, of course a two week Storytelling Tour of Scotland isn't enough! As soon as we get home, on the 9th August, we'll be storytelling again here on Dartmoor at Chi Camp, organised by Angus Clarke of Living Movement. And then the following week we're off to this year's Uncivilisation Festival, which promises to be an altogether wilder, more acoustic and edgy affair than last year's. Have a look at the full programme - full of thought-provoking, soul and mind-stirring talks, performances and discussions, honourings of the road protests of the 1990s, superb music, scything workshops, herb walks, writing workshops, poetry, feral theatre, Brythonic music and fireside dancing courtesy of our friends Wod, childrens' council, folktales and much much more. For some time we've been plotting with a group of others - Mearcstapa - tasked with the weaving of art and a certain strangeness into the festival. As the programme describes us:

A collective of artists and performers who have been granted a fool’s licence to bring an anarchic creativity to the festival. They will provide an unpredictable extra layer to the programme: shape-shifting theatre; art and performance on the edges; the festival’s dark fringe spilling from the woods into the main spaces. There will be opportunities to take part, make your own art, and join them for a wild hunt in the woods!

We can't tell you what that will involve yet, you'll have to look out of the corners of your eyes when you get to the festival, but we hope it will honour the old gods of the land, and whip up an uneasy delight.

And the story Tom and I will be telling around the fire on the friday night will be a strange and wonderful and icy tale from the ferocious mythology of Chukotka, on the far eastern tip of Siberia. As the programme says:

Tom Hirons and Rima Staines bring you a tale from the Chukchi people of the far edge of Siberia: a tale of flying tongues and talking skulls, underworld wives and star-brothers, transformings and boundary-crossings and obsidian and fire-breathing reindeer. Sit by the fire; bring your blankets and your unrepentant strangeness, and be ready for curious happenings. At the main firepit, by the marquee.

If you'd like to buy tickets for Uncivilisation, be quick about it, there are less than 60 left, and they do tend to sell out.

~ ~ ~

If, as we head north tomorrow, you should be heading south-west, I must recommend a lovely little gallery of local art and craft that has recently opened in Chagford - Artisan. I have work on show there - giclée prints and originals - alongside some of my talented Dartmoor neighbours: Virginia Lee, Danielle Barlow, Jason of England, Miriam Boy, Helen Melland, Yuli Somme and many others to come. 

The gallery is run by Colette and Martin Brady, who wanted to create a space for local artists and craftspeople to showcase their work, and Chagford is delighted! Martin is also a leatherworker and his little workbench sits at the back of the gallery space, where you can see him completing the many commissions he's received since opening just a few weeks ago.

For those of you who can spot my work here amongst all the other delights, and are wondering who made the beautiful rustic frames - these are by David Winter, up in Yorkshire, who now provides all my frames for shows and galleries. He makes them from old pallets and wood found in skips, which he transforms into beautiful rustic dark-waxed frames, some still with old nails and staples embedded in the wood. I'm delighted to have found him, as these frames he makes are exactly what I'd make if I had the time to frame my work myself. I'd heartily recommend his craftsmanship and friendly service to anyone wondering how to frame prints of my work. He has an etsy shop too.

 

 

And for those of you in and around Devon during September, I'll be taking part in the popular Devon Open Studios event, for which I'll have to prepare frantically as soon as we return from our summer shenanigans.

~ ~ ~

In our little cottage, as we stack boxes of kettles and tarps and prints and masks and diesel oil and spare loo roll and firewood and tea by the door, Macha looks at us reproachfully, knowing Something's Afoot.

Across the blue sky of July, the sun stares eye to eye with the daisies - each radiant eye looking into this day of ours, full of as many plans as daisy petals.

And we stand in the sun's light, our shadows long and reaching north. The three of us, off on an adventure...