On the trail of art

2:58pm Wednesday 3rd September 2008

WITH just two days to go before this year’s E17 Art Trail opens, artists across Walthamstow are putting last minute touches to their work.

The tale of a tailor who is teased because his work is so intricate is the subject of an usual puppet show at Firmans Court, 265 Wood Street, on September 13 and 14.

The Little Seamstress is based on a short story by Mexican guerilla fighter and magic realist writer Subcomandante Marcos, and a piece of music inspired by it by Norwegian composer Martin Aasurd.

Artist Lucy Tavener, 34, of Wood Street, is making the puppets out of clay and wood.

She said: “The seamstress is actually a little old man and he’s mocked for his talent for making beautiful things so he takes revenge by stitching the mouths of those who mock him.

“The story is wonderful but the music was what inspired me because it is so quirky and beautiful.”

Pulling the strings will be puppeteer Emeil Kahraman, 26, said, who lives on a canal boat in Walthamstow. She said puppetering was the only way she could make sense of our big crazy world.

Beloved of some, despised by others, the common garden gnome will become the centrepiece of an art installation in this year’s trail.

Urban Zen and the Arts and Crafts movement have created a work which combines everyone’s favourite garden ornament with the borough’s most famous artist, William Morris.

The group of around gnomes can be found In the front garden of the fire station on Forest Road, Walthamstow, the former site of Elm House where Morris was born in 1834.

Creator of the piece, artist Della Rees, said: “I hope the piece will acknowledge the area’s history and remind people of the borough’s rich artistic significance and be a small tribute to William Morris and the arts and crafts movement.

“It might also provide a reason to spend a moment thinking about art or even give people a reason to smile or laugh.”

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