MU Branch meeting: Historic Jewellery Reproduction

Tonight's Mothers' Union branch meeting at St John's Seven Kings featured a fascinating talk by Audrey Shorer about Historic Jewellery Reproduction, a business begun by her late husband Peter Shorer.

Peter was an acclaimed archaeologist and conservator at the British Museum for over 40 years. With his unprecedented experience of many years working with antiquities at the British Museum and countless other museums throughout the world, he was one of the select few antiquarians allowed to handle and take moulds from these rare and priceless artefacts. His amazing reproductions have been acclaimed for many years as stimulating and exciting aids to the world’s history lessons and lectures as well as being a necessary part of historic cinema and televisual productions. His company, Historic Jewellery Reproduction, has become the leading retailer of a specialist range of historic artefacts and stunning gold, silver and precious stone-set jewellery which have the uniqueness of being exact reproductions of the original exquisite pieces. 

Audrey showed us examples ranging from the Winchester Helmet to the Khi Rho brooch I bought to wear on my cassock alb. She also spoke about the excavations with which Peter was involved, including those of the shipwreck sites for the Girona and Concepción.

Peter was a member of commission4mission and took part in c4m's first exhibition as part of the Pentecost Festival in the gallery space at Methodist Central Hall Westminster.

-----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

This Mortal Coil - The Jeweller.

Boundary Breaker III

Ill, ill, lying by Siloam pool
with no way to enter its stirred waters.
Stuck, stuck, like sinking in quicksand,
no panic you think, relax, stay afloat.
Amazing how we accommodate disaster!
‘Do you want to get well?’ I say.
Have you accepted your lot?
Are you happy being stuck?
Change, change, the offer of choice -
‘Get up, take your bed and walk.’
Dare you to move, dare you to change.
Dare you to move, and you do!  

----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

Nick Cave and the Bad Seeds - God Is In The House.

A refreshing vision of religion

Jay Lakhani from the Hindu Academy (who spoke at the launch of the Seven Kings & Newbury Park Sophia Hub pilot) is involved in producing a fresh series of talks on Hinduism offering a more refreshing vision of religion suited to the needs of youth. This series is being shown every Sunday morning on sky 793 (MATV)  normally at 11.00am (but at 12noon on the first Sunday of each month). Jay says that this series does not preach or impose Hinduism - it allows the youngsters to come to terms with their religion in a structured and rational format.

-----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

Aradhna - Mukteshwar.

Grigor Narekatsi

The latest ArtWay meditation concerns a piece by Dutch artist Hanneke de Munck, who scraped out a piece of driftwood to make a primitive field shrine to which she tied the sculpture of a young desperate girl, cut from purple wood from South America. The poem by which the work was inspired is part of the Book of Lamentations written by Grigor Narekatsi, a 10th-century Armenian monk.

Saint Gregory of Narek (Grigor Narekatsi, c. 945-1005) was son of the learned bishop Khosrov Andzevatsi and most renowned pupil of the Narek School. The first great Armenian poet, Narekatsi skilfully united the finest achievements of his country's hymnography. Adopting a liberal approach to Armenian folk and bardic styles, Narekatsi ascended to the intellectual and artistic level of the foremost Byzantine, Persian and Arab literary movements of his day and with deep emotional intensity and fiery imagination, he added new aspects to Armenian poetry. He opened up new horizons for Armenian culture through his 'Book of Lamentations'. In the 'Book of Lamentations' Narekatsi is filled with a sorrow embracing the whole universe and conducts a heavenly discussion with the supreme Self. In his poems he has his feet firmly on the ground and directs his gaze towards the world around him, radiating wonder and ecstasy at the sight of the natural beauty of his native land, as in the hymn for the Transfiguration:

'The gem-rose bloomed with brilliance
From the radiance of the sun.
While high above that splendour
Floated the flower of the seas.'

As a musician Narekatsi gave a tremendous stimulus to medieval Armenian hymnography, imparting it with new life and soul. His words have since inspired at least one other musical masterpiece; Alfred Schnittke's Choir Concerto is a setting of words from 'The Book of Lamentations' written in 1984/5 and scored for very large choir. 

Here is another of Narekatsi's poems:

The Christ Child

The lips of the Christ-child are like two twin leaves;

They let roses fall when he smiles tenderly.

The tears of the Christ-child are pearls when he grieves;

The eyes of the Christ-child are deep as the sea.

Like pomegranate grains are the dimples he hath,

And clustering lilies spring up in his path.

Translated from the Armenian by Alice Stone Blackwell (1857-1950)

--------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

Alfred Schnittke - Choir Concerto.

Boundary Breaker II

You reached out and touched me -
aged and frail from constant menstruation,
seepage and flow of life’s blood,
stained and strained you reached out
to touch a hem, the merest flicker of a thread,
yet connecting and exchanging,
receiving purity for uncleanness,
healing for disease, transferring your afflictions
onto me; the pure one made unclean,
the healer become the diseased,
we change places, you rising, I falling,
partners for a moment in the dance of love.

------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

Mumford and Sons - I Get By With A Little Help From My Friends.

Windows on the world (251)

Leavesden, 2013

------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

Simon and Garfunkel - For Emily, Whenever I May Find Her.

Boundary Breaker I

Part 1 of my latest six-part poem entitled 'Boundary Breaker':

Our enemy, my friend.
Titus, dressed in your lorica plumata,
paludamentum flaring round you in the breeze
and fastened at your shoulder,
the very image of the professional officer;
vine-stick as symbol of your authority
to order this one to "Go" and that one to "Come".
"Go," "Come," "Do this," "Do that,"
and your servant, your slave, simply acts.
Yet this man that you order so and so
is dear to you, very dear, sharing your bed,
your own pais, ailing and sick,
for whom you will intercede.
Our enemy, their friend,
my elders testify to me; you love our people,
your built our synagogue, your love
radical in action crosses boundaries of race,
religion, sexuality and class.
Your love is faith in action.
If faith without deeds is dead,
your faith is alive, more so than any in Israel.

--------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

Paul Simon - Love And Hard Times.