Tag: Redbox Gallery

Flame, Flood & Were-Wolf

Planning the Redbox Gallery Baring Gould Centenary Show

There’s so much that I’d like to include in my Redbox Gallery show but there’s only so much that you can fit into a phone box but the good thing about the limitations is that it makes me focus on the essentials of the story. I will be able to squeeze in a few extras though because I’m able to include an animation playing on a continuous loop.

Rough plans for Baring Gould show

1865 proved to be a productive year for Horbury’s new curate, Sabine Baring Gould as not only did write the hymn Onward Christian Soldiers for the church’s Whitsuntide Walk from the mission at Horbury Bridge to St Peter’s, he also published The Book of Were-Wolves and was inspired to turn his experiences in Horbury into a melodramatic novel, Through Flood and Flame.

By the way, this is my first post using a new theme, WordPress 2024, and I’m using Lightbox for some images, for instance this one: hover over it and click to see full size (and click again off the image to return to this post).

Were-wolves animation
Redbox set
Click for full size image.

Of course the were-wolves were the subject that I wanted to start trying out my Procreate animation skills on but there are some colourful characters to include in the novel and, if times permits, including Onward Christian Soldiers would give me plenty of practice on animating a variety of characters walking.

I reassembled the set from a previous Redbox show and carefully measured up check on how much room I had available for the display.

Church procession

John Carr Anniversary Display

arch cut-out model

It’s a bit of a challenge fitting the life and works of Yorkshire architect John Carr into a phone box but I’ve got all the elements here:

  • Portrait
  • Brief biography with some key dates
  • Quotes, such as ‘I always drink 7 to 8 glasses of wine with a meal . . .’
  • Models of a selection of his buildings
cutting out the arch
Cutting out the model of Carr’s Harewood Grand Lodge

To speed up constructing the models from cardboard cartons, I’ve invested in a glue gun. For think corrugated cardboard like this I find a stout pair of scissors more useful than a sharp craft knife.

Cutting Corners

model fireplace

I’ve made a start on the fireplace for the Redbox Gallery’s Night Before Christmas display but I keep going back to my model to work out the details on the grounds that it’s easier to make changes there than it is when you’ve already cut into an A1 sheet of foamboard.

Redbox Gallery model

There’s not a lot of room for the armchair and table we’re planning to add but hopefully I can dovetail a couple of foamboard cut-outs into the two corners without obscuring the fireplace.

The Night before the Night Before

The Night before Christmas rough

The night before Christmas: ‘a fire place with roaring fire & stockings hung down. Maybe a chair & table & treats left out for Santa on the table . . .’

That’s what we’re aiming for, now all we have to do is work out how to fit all that into the Redbox Gallery, the old telephone box on Queen Street, Horbury.

Christmas set rough

I’m designing the stage set and it will be up to the local Brownies to add the decorations. I think that I could fit a small fireplace diagonally across the far corner of the box but that doesn’t leave any room for a table and chair, so I’m imagining those as illustrated cut-outs, as if we were looking at a pop-up Christmas card.

Redbox Show

Redbox Gallery
chimnies

Thanks to my scale model, we found that my Addingford and Joby cut-outs just fitted into the Redbox Gallery, although we did have to do a bit of jiggling about with the lengths of 10lb breaking strain fishing line that are holding up the storks cut-out and the speech bubbles.

Redbox Gallery show
St Peter's Church, Horbury

On Tuesday I drew St Peter’s Church spire from the dentist’s waiting room, which is just around the corner from the Redbox.

The Watchers by the Pond

cut-out figures
speech bubble
First rough for a speech bubble.

More unusual visitors at our garden pond and although my cut-out characters now bear little resemblance to the Patrick Stewart and Richard Tolan as Joby and his dad in the Yorkshire Television version of Stan Barstow’s Joby, they have the folksy quality that I was after for my Redbox Gallery show.

They’ll be sitting on a riverbank, a folding screen of two A1 sheets of foamboard. Time to get out my largest brush, a varnish brush, to add the indigo blue of the Calder.

river artwork

Boxed In

mock-up of phone box display

This morning we took a look at a gardening display in the old telephone box at Horbury Bridge, which included a small selection of items – a tomato plant, a pair of gardening gloves and a trowel – to tell its story. It made me realise that the simpler and bolder my display for the Redbox Gallery, the better.

My main characters were always going to be Joby and his dad from Stan Barstow’s novel and I realise that including historical characters, such as railway and canal engineers, will overload the display.

Watching the closing scene of Yorkshire Television’s 1975 production of Joby on YouTube, I’ve found a perfect exchange of dialogue which will work as the keynote for my show. I’d been thinking of phrases to sum up Addingford such as ‘just ten minutes walk from this phone box’ and ‘Horbury’s unofficial nature park’, which would be fine but I don’t want too many text boxes. People often skip reading labels but dialogue is more compelling.

As we’re trying to get people to stop briefly and peer into the box, we need something eye-catching – like the pocket cartoon amongst the articles in a newspaper – to hook passers by.

Redbox Mock-up

Addingford Steps

I’ve added a light watercolour wash to my sketch map and to the Addingford Steps A1-size pen and ink artwork, keeping it light so that it shows up when viewed through the windows of the Redbox Gallery.

sketch map

These two panels are the backdrop and the cut-out figures that are the main event.

mock-up
scale model

I’ve printed small scale versions to try for size in my mock-up phone box.

I feel that the Redbox is more like a shop window than a regular gallery. Five minutes wouldn’t be long to spend wander around a small show in a regular gallery, but five minutes peering into a phone box would be a lot to ask.

Boxing Clever

scale model

At this rate I’m going to spend more time working on my scale model than on the actual exhibit in Horbury’s Redbox Gallery, but it’s better to sort things out at this stage, rather than hope for the best when it comes to installing it.

rough sketches
steps sketch

I’ve thought about using recycled materials only, but there’s a slight risk that, although the box is watertight, if we had a spell of really wet weather, it might get humid in there, which would warp the corrugated cardboard that I had in mind. Graham, from the Civic Society who maintain the box, suggests thin marine ply, but that’s going to be difficult to cut out when I draw my cast of characters and scenery.

So, as illustrated in my scale model above, I think that the most practical solution would be white foam board, which is very light, dimensionally stable and much easier to cut. Half a dozen A1 boards would be as much as I’d need.

Making and Exhibition of Myself

Or there’s the conceptual approach.

‘Will you just stand in it and (try to) look interesting?’ asked my sister on Facebook.

cartoon character
storks sketch

Brilliant idea, here’s me practicing my ‘interesting’ look.

Should work like a charm.

Out of the Box

Redbox model

My first one-man show for over 25 years . . . and I’ve got to fill the entire gallery! The good news is that it’s the Redbox Gallery on Queen Street, Horbury: the box that appears on the cover of my local history booklet Around Old Horbury.

I’ve seen documentaries about how the Royal Academy prepares for a big show and it involves making a cardboard model of the gallery space, so here goes . . .