Happy Christmas!

This statue of a man with a roll of cloth is actually in Holland but seems fitting for my Christmas blog to you, fellow textile enthusiasts - thanks for all your support this year.

Thanks also to Mr Bitsbox for this photo among other things (no, I haven't been sneaking a peek in that posh bag under the wardrobe!). I couldn't have done any of it without you.

Amongst our festive postage this morning arrived a round robin from a dear friend I haven't seen for a guiltily long time - her daughters are now out there in the world after their education and her sons are now bigger than she is. How time flies.

Hope you all have a wonderful holiday and all the best for 2008!

Angels of the north

These angels have just settled on some rooftops near the ice-skating rink at Manchester Piccadilly Gardens.



The big wheel is still there near the Triangle shopping centre - you can go up on it and get an angel's eye view.

But not as high as these fellas.

I met the Manchester Morris Men getting their kit on in the foyer of the Royal Exchange Theatre. He has made a cute purpose-built box with shelves inside to home his baubles and bells.

One tree hill

I've updated all my blog lists and added a new page element - favourite films, with Christmas holidays in mind.

Also I've added a few books onto my reading list as ideas for great reads for Christmas. Meanwhile, here's a few festive photos from Macclesfield forest during last year's snow.

Some winter textures.

I've just started an etching of a view like this - a lone fence post strung out with wire against the fields. More on etching soon.

Tate Liverpool - the Turner Prize

Congratulations to Mark Wallinger who won the Turner Prize last night - he was my favourite when we visited the show at Tate Liverpool a couple of weeks ago with some Dutch friends. Here's a review in the Guardian and here is a set of 10 photographs from the exhibition (unfortunately the item on Channel 4 news last night didn't show any pictures or review the contestants).

Wallinger's piece is a video of himself walking around an empty gallery in Berlin while wearing a bear suit (yes, that's right, a bear suit) but of course there's more to it than that . . . I'm reluctant to say more because I think you should go and see it for yourself and have your own reactions to it. What I will say though is that ideas about national identity and immigration come to mind - Wallinger has written a very interesting note for the viewer to read just outside the video room but I always think it's a good idea to have a look at the work yourself first before reading these as the work should speak for itself first before any text. The prize was also given to Wallinger in recognition of an extraordinary work which isn't actually there in the show - State Britain - a comment on the Iraq war and peace campaigner Brian Haw who has been protesting outside Parliament since 2001.

The other works that struck me at the Tate were the photographs and video made by Zarina Bhimji. Her photographs capture remnants of human activity in the landscape and places that have been previously inhabited by people and then abandoned. Her video installation is called 'Waiting' and records the activities in a factory filled with machinery processing sisal to make floor covering (but again, is much more than this). The colours are amazing and the sound track mesmerising in contrast to the Wallinger film which is deliberately low tech and has no sound track.

While you're there, pop over to see Antony Gormley's figures in his work Another Place at Crosby Beach (which explains the picture at the top of this blog!). And we found that much of central Liverpool has been improved for the Year of Culture 08 with pedestrianised walkways, new squares and cleaned up buildings so you can really look up and see all the beautiful Victorian and Georgian buildings that Liverpool has to offer (plus some brilliant Christmas shopping!).