Do not look too hard for meaning here, I am not a historian, I am an artist, that's all you need to know.
Deep in the mountains of my mind there is a sacred place where there is a monument to skill
Journeys as pilgrimages
Early English motorcycle helmet: title of a GP piece that looks like something vaguely Viking from 1200 years ago that's just been excavated, displayed next to the helmet GP made for his trip round Europe with Alan Measles.
If Alan measles had been around in ancient Egypt he would have hung out with Bes.
A walk in Bloomsbury, an encounter with the world: 'the journey has become a tired metaphor of reality television, describing a transformative experience.'
Ritual can become stultified if not kept relevant to its time and context
Shrines - in your pocket, in a corner of your house, or by a roadside, portable.
I can make art with hardly any money and on the kitchen table
A forge for turning old people into young, Russian print 1800
Fallen giant - cf Jerusalem, I wanted to make something that was about England
The Rosetta vase, yellow, covered with incantations (see picture in my earlier post)
Boli or power figure, from Mali, raw potency, pared down, apparently modern
Everything in the BM was contemporary once. The frivolous now, companion to Rosetta. I wanted it to have the look of a mystical diagram whilst the content consisted of banalities and buzzwords of Feb 2011.
Hello kitty hand towel pilgrimage souvenir
We trust maps. I like maps of feelings, beliefs and the irrational, they use our trust of maps to persuade us that there might be some truth in their beauty.
The wheel of life Tibet 1900. A map and self-help chart combined
Map of truths and beliefs. The entire landscape is a graveyard
Pilgrims travel light so the souvenir may be only a badge, a photo or a signature.
Map based on Bunyan's Pilgrims Progress. 1800.
Confucius
Votive stupas
Our father and mother - pilgrims made of iron
Tate Modern is the cathedral of the cult of modern art.
Relics
The chevalier d'Eon de Beaumont, 1728 - 1810. French diplomat, spy, soldier and Freemason whose first 49 years were spent as a man, and whose last 33 years were spent as a woman. Died in England, buried in St Pancras churchyard.
Journeyman cabinet maker carrying the tools of his trade
Sheela-na-gig. PJ Harvey album of the same name
Do go and see this exhibition, whatever your craft, it's been extended for another month until February 26th.
This is the link to the British Museum teaser about the show: http://bri.mu/r0v6jH
Here's a link to the notes I took on my first visit to the exhibition: http://jayoptimistic.blogspot.co.uk/2011/12/grayson-perry-exhibition-tomb-of.html
