R and I went to Compton Verney again today, to see the exhibition Troublemakers and Prophets, which included work by a number of artists, but centred around the textile artworks created by Elizabeth ‘Queen’ Allen. Allen was an extraordinary person, who overcame poverty, isolation, and physical and mental challenges, to produce work which was in turns mischievous, challenging and disturbing. Ultimately, in just the last few years of her life, her art found a market among galleries and private collectors around the world, but in the almost sixty years since her death she’s faded from the public consciousness again. We both enjoyed the exhibition a lot; it’s reviewed by The Guardian here, and there’s much more about Elizabeth Allen and Bridget Poole, the young art student who went to live with her for the last few years of her life, here.
Out in the grounds we found that it was possible to access a path we hadn’t known about before, which crosses the lake alongside the road bridge, but just inside the estate boundary. This took us right past the nest of the Great Crested Grebes, on which the male was diligently snoozing. He gave no sign of being concerned about the humans marching back and forth thirty metres in front of him, and seems to feel quite safe on the platform he and his mate have created. On the subject of whom, there was absolutely no sign of her today, though I didn’t have time to go and check the reed bed near the pond dipping platform, which on our previous visit seemed to be her favourite section of the lake.
At one point the male left the nest and began swimming around it, and I assumed that he was now concerned about the female and starting to look for her, but it turned out that he’d just decided to collect some more water plants to reinforce the nest platform. When we saw the pair of them a month ago it seemed to me that he was rather keener on the whole nesting business than his mate was, and now that the nest is built – and I would guess, populated with eggs – he appears to be quite happy sitting on it on his own.
R: L2, C8, D17.
