Crow Country
Most days they are my background sound, and sometimes I stop, sit, and take time to watch their flapping rise, fall and curving in the sky above the line of trees which form the view from my workshop. Occasionally lone birds will caw and rattle at me from their perch at the top of my old sycamore tree.
I’m especially alert to them just now as I’m reading Crow Country, a book by Mark Cocker, from which I’m learing so much about these beautiful birds, and Rooks in particular.
I’m reminded of how consumed by corvids I was whilst sculpting and carving them, particularly this piece. The quick sketches are of birds striding in the field just over the fence from where I work, they don’t like being watched and are soon in flight, so the drawings are, out of necessity, hasty.
They culminated in another crow sculpture
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2 Comments
Such a favourite book of mine, Jennifer, as it charts the corvids along the river Yare, just five miles or so from the village in which I grew up. Cocker’s descriptions of murmuations etc. are second to none. I have enjoyed hearing him speak on occasions. I love the energy and form in your crow drawings and sculpture. I’m just back from my art class, where I have been attempting a very shaggy impasto hedgehog with a palette knife!
Your class sounds fantastic – hope you’ll show us Hedgehog. Would love to hear him speak too, especially if it was about rooks.