Classic Indian silent literally has a cast of thousands
THEY’RE doing another film show at the City Museum next month, with a screening of a silent-era masterpiece from India.
The double bill, presented in partnership with SWSilents, headlines with ‘A Throw of the Dice’, made in 1929 and based on an episode from the Mahabharata, one of the Sanskrit epics of ancient India. In the story, two neighbouring kings are in love with the same woman. It literally has a cast of thousands – the stars and 10,000 extras.
After that there will also be screenings of some home movies from India from the British Empire & Commonwealth Collection.
The show comes with live musical accompaniment by Stephen Horne (piano) and Jeevan Singh (tabla & dhol), and there’ll be a bar.
The show is at Bristol Museum & Art Gallery on Thursday February 21, doors open 6.30pm, show starts 7pm and tickets are £10/£8 (concessions). For further details and bookings see https://tinyurl.com/ ybu5hk95
Angela Carter show
As you may know, the author Angela Carter, whose reputation has been growing since her death, spent some years living in Bristol, and it was in Bristol that she produced some of her best novels. This, of course, was entirely thanks to the Post as when she applied for a journalism job here in the 1960s, she was turned down and so took to taking an English degree and writing fiction instead. Though she did write for the arts pages of the Western Daily as a student.
A couple of years back, local author and playwright Anthony (“A.C.H.”) Smith (of ‘Up the Feeder, Down the ‘Mouth’ fame - he also knew Carter personally as he, too, worked on the Western Daily), working with composer Christopher Northam, produced a stage version of ‘Pussy’, an adaptation of Carter’s somewhat raunchy take on the story of Puss In Boots. The show played for four nights at the Alma Vale Theatre to packed audiences and was very well received. “Raucously funny … a fabulous job”, said one reviewer.
Now it is to be staged again, and as it’s only 45 minutes long, it will be accompanied by a production of another Carter short story, ‘The Ruby Choker’. Last time out, the accompaniment was just a keyboard, but this time you get a small chamber orchestra.
The show is on for three nights, Saturday 26 to Monday 28 January at the Improv Theatre on St Paul’s Road (formerly the Polish Club). For further information and booking see: www.improvtheatre.co.uk
Aerospace award
Enormous congratulations to Aerospace Bristol, who recently bagged over half a million pounds to restore the WW1-era aircraft hangar at Filton.
The Biffa Award grant of £547,277 means the hangar will become publicly accessible, and that visitors will be able to watch “conservation in action” as volunteers undertake various aerospace conservation and restoration projects.
Once it’s up and running, you will be able to watch work taking place on such historic Bristol aircraft as the Bristol Freighter, Fighter, and Bolingbroke.
Restoration of the hangar – which, until recently, was home to the GWAAC air ambulance helicopter - has been made possible by Biffa Award: a fund that awards grants to communities and environmental projects across the UK.
Lloyd Burnell, Executive Director of Aerospace Bristol, said: “This fantastic grant from Biffa Award has given us the opportunity to repurpose the building to become an exciting new part of the visitor experience ... Most museum conservation work is undertaken behind ‘closed doors’, unseen by the public. But as a result of bringing conservation into public view, visitors will not only learn more about the Aerospace Bristol story, but also how vital heritage skills are saving the nation’s past.”
The project underlines once more the essential part that the volunteers have played in setting up Aerospace Bristol and in keeping Bristol’s aviation heritage alive. More than 150 former aerospace workers and members of the community spent thousands of hours restoring and looking after objects that are now on display at Aero- space Bristol. The new facility, says Aerospace Bristol, will allow many of these volunteers, and new members of the volunteer team, to put their skills to good use and share their knowledge with a new generation of engineers and innovators.
Jess Stone, Aerospace Bristol volunteer and Airbus Undergraduate Engineering Apprentice, said: “This is an amazing opportunity for young people to learn from the older generation, who have so much experience and knowledge of Bristol aircraft.”
Restoration work on the hangar is set to begin soon, and should be completed by the autumn of this year.
» Meanwhile, if you or any member of your family worked on Concorde, make sure you get Bristol Times next Tuesday. Your memories are needed for the 50th anniversary of Concorde 002’s first flight, and you could win a rather nifty prize.
Women photographers
Some weeks ago, this column was asking readers if they could tell us anything about women who worked as professional photographers in Bristol in ye olden days. The response we had was, well … I expect everyone was too busy with Christmas to write or mail us.
However, the good people at the Bristol Central Library did send us a list of Bristol photographers from the 1850s to the 1970s extracted from trade directories, and there are a few in there. Names include:
» Lily Anstey, 10 Mivart Street, Easton, 1940s
» Joan Barker, 12 Eastfield Road, Westbury-on-Trym, 1920s-30s
» Lilian Beel or Bell, 84 Park Street, 1900s-1940s
» “Madame Brummer”, Clifton, 1870s
» Miss Call (no forename or initials), Queens Road, 1880
» Kathleen Chivers, Park Street, 1920s and 30s
» Elizabeth Clare, Cheltenham Road, 19-teens
» Elizabeth Eden, Ruysdael Place, Queens Road, 1870s
» Edna Fowler, 12 Old Market Street, 1920s-30s
» Madame Grayson-Foster, Queens Road, 1920s-30s
» Marion Hellyer, Whiteladies Road, 19-teens
» Mrs S. Knapp, Marlborough Street, 1910
» Sally Loveday, Merchants Road, Clifton, 1930s
» Mrs Snary, Castle Street, 1880s
» Ida Spurge, Queens Road, 19131928
» Kathleen Stanley, East Street, Bedminster, 1940s
» Evelyn Webb, Queens Road, 19191927
» Mrs West, Clifton Observatory, 1885-1899
That’s only the ones from a very long list which can positively be identified as female. There will be other women listed merely as initials and surnames, and others still who were employees of larger photographic firms.
While some of these women were the wives of professional photographers, helping out with the business and sometimes taking it over when their husbands died, there are nonetheless many who plainly set up to trade on their own behalf.
This is really interesting, isn’t it? From Victorian times until WW2 and beyond, it’s fairly unusual to find women setting up businesses of any description. While some of them clearly didn’t last long, others made a success of it. One can imagine that Mrs West at the Observatory probably made a good living on weekends and bank holidays when families and couples were passing on a day out and decided to nip in to have their pictures taken.
Up to the 1930s and beyond, these photographers would simply have made their money by just taking studio portraits of paying customers. But there were probably one or two who attempted street scenes or arty shots from time to time.
So I reckon there are some good stories here. If you recognise your great grandma or someone in that list, or if anyone in your family tree was a lady professional photographer, tell us about her. Better still, send us some pictures …
Cheers then!