Tag: travel

  • Feedback on the blog

    Many thanks to everyone who responded to last week’s request for feedback. It is appreciated. Some things readers said… Phew! That is a good amount of great feedback, isn’t it? There are some things that people have suggested might make the blog better to read. These are technical things such as the placement of the…

  • Of cranberries and kahikatea

    Weekends on the West Coast are spent exploring the area and this week that exploration took in cranberry growing and kahikatea forests. Agriculture in Aotearoa New Zealand is the largest part of the economy with regards to trade, and is unique in having an unsubsidised agricultural sector as a result of reforms aimed at making…

  • This week’s Spotify playlist

    Each week a Spotify list is curated to go along with the blog. Each piece on the list is relevant to the blog entries, with a mix of old and new music and sound from across the globe. Those with a Spotify subscription will be able to listen to the entire playlist without interruption, those…

  • The Sony World Photography Awards

    The winners of the prestigious Sony World Photography Awards have just been announced. To see the images head on over to the BBC website here. The Photographer of the Year is Juliette Pavy with Spiralkampagnen, a documentary series about the forced sterilisation of Inuit women in Greenland. Several thousand girls and women were fitted with…

  • An ancient Chinese scroll animated

    This week the next in the series of Conversation and Cloth talks took place in the Regent Theatre in Māwhera Greymouth. This time the theme was Art and Artists and clothes, costumes, fabrics and decorative items were all part of the show-and-tell. There were books to go along with the talk too. The series focuses…

  • Abdoulaye Konaté

    Abdoulaye Konaté is an artist from Mali who uses textiles to comment on politics and environment. In his large-scale works the artist stitches cloths together to create colourful and powerful pieces that reflect Mali’s rich heritage and culture of cloth and music, as in this show, Symphonie en couleur, held in London in 2022.

  • Murals at Pompeii

    Nearly 2000 years ago, the Italian city of Pompeii was obliterated by the eruption of Mount Vesuvius. The blast covered the settlement with ash and pumice that preserved, sometimes in remarkable detail, the details of everyday life in this Roman city. Over decades the site has been the focus of archaeology with astonishing finds showing…

  • This week’s Spotify playlist

    Each blog is accompanied by a Spotify playlist, a curated selection of audio that relates in some way to the blog and, occasionally, to current events, such as this week’s eclipse. Paid subscribers to Spotify will hear all the songs in the playlist on the player above or in your own app while free subscriptions…

  • Textiles from the Indian Subcontinent

    If you have ever fancied learning something about the fascinating textiles from India check out a free online course. Run by the MAP Academy the course is just one of the variety on offer that include art history, sculpture, archeology and architecture. This course looks at textiles, through videos, illustrations and texts, in their broad…

  • Yarn at Reefton

    On Tuesday the 21st May Reefton is holding its annual fibre day. This year the theme is “Journeys in Yarn” and the speakers will be talking about their experiences as crafters and artists, or about trips they have taken because of their love of yarn. The event is on from 10m until 3pm and there…