Sunday, October 18, 2009

Art journaling: soap gets in your eyes




THE LAND OF THE ODD
digital scrapbook layout
12ins x 12ins

It may be that I am missing out on some the most culturally important dramatic works of the late twentieth and early twenty-first centuries but try as I may, I find watching television soaps considerably less interesting than waiting for paint to dry and therefore, I can't follow them. However, I do recall that a few years ago, in an attempt to boost viewing figures, producers decided to wake-up residents of the sleepy, sudsy world that was Emmerdale Farm by crashing a plane into the village. Ever since that momentous event, Emmerdale would appear to have been in dramatic free-fall. My dad is devoted to the show and so I turned to him when I wanted to identify the characters featured in a photograph that I'd torn from a copy of The Mirror: for some inexplicable reason, it had screamed out "pointy hats and wings! Pointy hats and wings!". Anyway: on the right of the photograph is the lovely Laurel whom my dad adores. Her first appearance in Emmerdale was at Marlon and Tricia's engagement party, when she was dressed as a bumblebee. A few years later she married the local vicar (I am supposing, having first divested herself of the said bumblebee costume) who is named Ashley (pictured in the centre of the photograph). You may be interested to know that Laurel and Ashley arrived home for their wedding night to find Ashley’s estranged father Sandy in their marital bed. Laurel subsequently helped her husband to bond with his father: not, I assume, whilst all three of them were in the marital bed together. According to my dad, the lady on the left of the photo is another vicar's wife, who fancies Ashley. At least, I think it's the wife, not the other vicar, who fancies Ashley and I don't think either of the vicars wears a bumblebee costume but do please feel free to use this idea as a journaling prompt and link back to this page so that I can enjoy your creations.
My dad was explaining all this to me whilst suffering from a bad head cold and so I thought that perhaps he was getting the plot lines a little muddled-up. But a quick inspection of the Emmerdale web site revealed that my dad was actually in Emmerdale For Dummies mode. Here's a just short extract from Laurel's Wikipedia entry:
 On 23 January 2009, after talking to Jasmine about Shane and after voicing concern that she thought Jasmine was pregnant, Laurel learned from Jasmine how Shane had tried to rape her and that she had murdered him. Laurel told Jasmine that she must go to the police and confess as, if she explained how Shane had tried to rape her she might get let off as it may be been as self defence. Jasmine, however, explained that it was not in self defence and that she would go to the police in a few days. However she and Debbie decided to flee instead.

If Emmerdale is on the GCSE syllabus, then I take back everything I might have said about exams being dumbed down. This is FAR more complex than any of that Shakespeare and Marlow stuff that I studied for "A" level English. 

This week, I'm blogging this from Holland where I've come to visit my brother. You may well enquire why I've been wittering on about Emmerdale when I could be sharing all the lovely things that I'm experiencing here. It's sad, I know, but ever since I found the Emmerdale photograph, I've had that inexplicable urge to do the pointy hat and wings thing and I could not move on until the deed was done. Brace yourselves: I have so enjoyed this diverting little exercise that I'm considering embarking upon the Zettification of other great dramatic moments. A collection of Market Harborough Amateur Dramatic Society photographs, taken in the 1950s, beckons...

10 comments:

Lori Saul said...

Wonderful piece- fun, creative and different! I'm not a soap person myself but they do play a big role in the cultural psyche of viewers- I think you gave the characters a lightness- they often take themselves so seriously. Beautifully done!

Caterina Giglio said...

Lord have mercy, these people so deserve wings and pointy hats and never was there a crowd of peeps more deserving of this what do you call it ? Zettification? and I cannot wait for the Zettification of other dramatic moments! Thank You for this!!! xo

Bea said...

LOL well this made me laugh. I do hope we get to see something of Holland. Remember some of us have to LIVE through you. I can think of a number of people present and past that could do with some applied Zetti. :)Bea

Gaby Bee said...

This is just wonderful! Beautifully done. Love especially the little bunny!

Unknown said...

I love how your composition makes them look like they're still on the telly .... a telly floating through space in a giant soap bubble about ready to burst - thank heaven for the wings or they'd be in for quite a crash :)

deb said...

lol u make me smile

DMG said...

Only you could come up with such a wonderfully ridiculous concept, my irreverent friend. I love this, and I simply cannot wait for more such nonsense. You made my evening, Lumi, light of my life!

Jill said...

Really enjoyed your blogs - and "losing the plot" as I often do here in Luton!! Was interested in your previous post about censorship and the power of words - even if no one but the writer sees them. I have just had a bit of self therapy writing down in my art journal how I felt about myself from the sublime to the ridiculous. It took a real effort to put some things down on paper but felt really good. I cannot think that anyone should censor your art - although it may change the way they thought of you - but you have to accept that if you choose to be controversial - not that using the f word these days is very controversial these days.

lynne h said...

lumi! you do wings and pointy hats WELL! i mean, i freakin' *love* it when you do it!! (not to mention that you make me laugh : ) xo

Taluula said...

Wow Miss Lumi this is amazing. Keep it up.