Reeds

February 18, 2018

It’s halfway through February and not long now until Sally and I present the work we have each developed in our Wicken Fen collaboration. I stopped posting regular updates of our visits to the Fen because they seemed very repetitive. And there have been a lot of them – at all times of year and in widely varying conditions. Although many visits seemed to develop their own theme – ice (visit 10); spiders and cobwebs (visit 9) …

The purpose of these repeated visits has been to experience the Fen at different times and seasons and allow ourselves to be led in new directions in response. We have used drawing, photography, talking and writing to record impressions and develop our ideas. That movement from gathering information to developing work is a difficult phase and this time at least I just didn’t want to blog about it. My ideas shifted over the course of the project and it was better to let them evolve in private.

So, here we are, less than two months until the exhibition, my studio filling up with work, and perhaps now it is time to talk about the main themes that I have homed in on. Let’s start with the reeds.

Reedbeds spring Helen Terry Wicken Fen.jpg

When I think of the fen, I think of the reeds. They are found everywhere and no matter what time of year you visit they set the character of the fen. When Sally and I first visited in early summer 2016, I was dismayed by the tall, thick stands of bright green reed that covered the fen, obscuring views of open water. At the height of summer, they close you in – you cannot see over or through them in places and you may even have to push through them where the path narrows. And the greenness merges into all the other greens, although the dark purple inflorescences are amazing.

But as the year progresses, the leaves fall, the stems slowly bleach and the low sun turns the seedheads pale gold and then silver. The fen opens out again and is filled with light. The silver reeds contrast with the charcoal greys of winter trees. It is more monochromatic but this is how I like to see it best.

Reedbed from Tower Hide Helen Terry Wicken Fen.jpg

Reed seedhead in winter Helen Terry Wicken Fen.jpg

Reedbed from East Mere Hide Helen Terry Wicken Fen-2.jpg

The sound changes too – from a soft, swishing whisper in summer to a dry rustling or crackling in winter. At some times and in some parts of the fen it is almost the only sound you hear. Often you also hear, though you may only glimpse, birds moving through the reedbed; while marsh harriers (or even hen harriers) glide over the top, hunting; and in the evenings flocks of swallows (summer) or starlings (winter) swoop over the reeds before settling to roost. I also love the sight of midges caught by the sunlight over the reeds - like gold dust.

Reedbeds and midges summer Helen Terry Wicken Fen.jpg

Common or Norfolk Reed (Phragmites Australis) grows up to 3 metres and is one of Britain’s tallest native grasses. Remarkably, there is more of the plant below ground than above:

“Strong horizontal rhizomes ramify the soil, sending up forests of vertical shoots that give rise to the aerial parts. The above-ground parts die each year, although the dead stems and leaf bases may remain standing for several years. The rhizome system however is perennial and potentially immortal, producing new growth and shoots year after year, perhaps for centuries.”

— Chapter 4"Reed beds", "Wicken Fen: the making of a wetland nature reserve"; TJ Bennett and L E Friday

Phragmites australis (illustration by D A Showler from "Wicken Fen: the making of a wetland nature reserve").

Reedbeds are essentially swamp and a transitional habitat between land and water. If the water is too deep aquatic plants have the edge; too dry and herbs and shrubs take over. At Wicken Fen a programme of cutting and burning is necessary to prevent the transition from reedbed to scrub and close monitoring and manipulation of water levels is essential to keep the fen wet but not too wet. What seems such a “natural”, unspoilt landscape actually depends upon human intervention to keep it in this transitional phase.

Reedbeds offer a diversity of habitat that is extremely valuable for birds and insects. Some British birds only breed in reedbeds and common reed supports a dazzling variety of invertebrates in every part of the plant. “Some of the rarest creatures on the reserve are also the smallest and least visible” is a remark made by one of the Managers at the Fen, that has stayed with Sally and me.

So where does this get me:

The reeds dominate the landscape, habitat, appearance, sound and colour of the fen.
They are a plant of the edge, neither land nor water, and constantly seeking to advance in either direction.
Seen vs unseen - they are highly visible but there is even more that is hidden. They have "secrets" in the form of invertebrates that live or breed within the plant or birds or mammals that hide in the reedbeds.
Light and colour - as ever I prefer the winter colours. Particularly the effects of the light in autumn and winter.

Reed imagery is featuring in most of my work, but I am particularly interested in the reflections they make in the water. More on this later.

More information:

Wicken Fen: the making of a wetland nature reserve - ed Laurie Friday (Harley Books / The National Trust. Colchester. 1997)
The Wildlife Trusts: Reedbeds
The Wildlife Trusts: Common Reed

Six islands

February 29, 2016

Wallasea Island, Foulness Island, Potton Island, Havengore Island, Rushley Island, New England Island - six islands. Clustered between the River Crouch, the River Roach and the North Sea - or rather Maplin Sands. Separated from each other by creeks. Restricted access over land. Only fully navigable at high tide.

A boat trip. The wind was in the east and it was bleak and cold. Even colder once we were out on the water. An icy, biting wind and no shelter. Poor light. All the colours greyed out. I've walked along the banks of the Crouch on a brilliantly sunny winter day and the colours were so rich - russets, golds, deep blues and greens. But this time everything was silver, grey, brown and black.

I like the marshes best when the tide is out. The exposed mud and the way it reflects the light is far more attractive to me than when the channels are full of water. But I was interested to see the shore from a different perspective - from the water rather than the land. And in this bleak, cold light the edge of the marsh was reduced to dark lines dividing water from sky. Horizontals. Only the occasional vertical line - channel markers, breakwaters, fence posts.

The islands have always been remote. Isolated farms. Nature reserves. MOD ranges. Smugglers ... Places for people who people who choose to be at the edge of things.

Ambiguous edges

October 25, 2015

I had spent ages mixing a palette of dye colours only to feel that the results were not what I wanted. I seriously considered discarding them and starting again. Fortunately I couldn't bring myself to throw away all that work - or waste the dye. So, I spent another couple of hours painting the dyes onto cloth. In an "I don't really care what happens here" frame of mind. Then leaving the dyed cloth to cure overnight. And finally several more hours of rinsing out and processing. All with fairly modest expectations of what I might get ... although increasingly more encouraged. Then I laid out the results on my studio table.

A dance-around-the-studio moment.

The photos could be sharper and the colours are not quite accurate (the camera struggled with these colours under artificial light), but never mind. It's the edges I am most pleased about. Looking at the photographs, I particularly like the way you can't readily distinguish the real edges of the cloth from the painted ones. I spent some time, moving pieces around, overlapping them in different ways, considering the possibilities.

Two Tree Island 25 September Helen Terry

Watching the tide turn

September 25, 2015

My previous visit to Two Tree Island a few weeks ago was at low tide, when all the mud was exposed. It was a damp, cool day and everything was grey and green. Revisiting the island today just after high tide, in glorious sunshine, it was all pale blue, grey and silver.

When I arrived the channel was full of water and I walked down the slipway to the water's edge and spent some time looking up and down the river. It is a long slipway and standing at the end, with the water lapping my boots, I could almost trick myself into a sense that I was standing in - or even on - the middle of the river. The water was mirroring the sky but was clear enough that at the same time I could see the bottom and the fish moving within it.

After a few minutes I turned around and was amazed at how much had changed behind me while my back was turned to the island. The edge of the island was emerging from the water, but not all at once. The mud is shaped by the waves into ripples, a simulacrum of the surface of the water itself. What I could see were the crests of these mud-waves which, as they emerged (to my eye), took the form of sinuous hieroglyphs while the water twisted and snaked between them.

As I watched, the relationship between solid and fluid was changing so fast that I almost couldn't see it happening. Positive and negative shapes enlarging and shrinking and shifting before my eyes. I mean, if I focused on a particular point of course I could see the mud emerge as the water receded. But everything was so mobile, the water, the reflections, the light; and as I gazed at the surface, there was simply a general impression of everything changing and moving moment by moment.

I like these ambiguities.

Green and Grey

September 6, 2015

I have been doing lots of walking. In North Norfolk and closer to home in Essex. August was unusually dull and wet but there were still a few bright sunny days. But now, as summer shifts into autumn, the first mists have appeared ... and lots of rain.

Wet weather strengthens the greens in the landscape. Brilliant greens against all shades of grey. Walking through the pine woods at Holkham, the pouring rain turned the moss an almost lurid emerald. On another day at Cley, mists veiled the ridge behind the marsh, muting all the colours in the background - blue-greys, green-greys.

Back at home, two days ago, we went for a walk around Two Tree Island. A nature reserve, the island is tiny and sits in the Thames Estuary between Leigh on Sea and Canvey Island. Saltmarsh and mud flats edge its northern shore where it runs into the estuary. The skies were pale, animated by banks of heavy cloud - greys tinged with blue and even violet.

Observing the transition between silver water, grey shining mud and the grey-greens of the salt marsh. All kinds of edges.

Edges

February 15, 2015

Last week I was in Norfolk, celebrating my birthday. We spent most of the time walking on the marshes and coast around Cley and Blakeney. On the day itself, we walked along Blakeney Point. Not all the way, owing to the cold and shortness of the winter day. Blakeney Point is a four mile long shingle spit that acts as a barrier between the North Sea and the coastal marshes. It is thought to be at least 4,000 years old at its core. And it is moving - very slowly - by about 1 metre per year towards the shore, so that the creeks and the salt marsh that have developed over thousands of years in its shelter are being gradually squeezed between the Point and the Cromer Ridge to the south. Old maps reveal how much the coastline has changed. Harbours have vanished, channels and creeks move and change shape.

When I walk here, I'm very aware of edges. The edge of the sea, the marsh, the creeks, the channel, the ridge. "Edge" suggests there's a point where one thing stops and another starts - each part separate, distinct. But it isn't like that here. Most of the edges here are dynamic - different when the tide is in to when it is out. And they are highly contested. What looks like a definite edge often isn't. When you look closer, water is encroaching into the marsh and cutting its way through the mud. Marsh plants creep out into the mud and the shingle, knitting soft, shifting ground into something firmer. Most of these edges are places of change, transition, succession. They are places where things are not settled. Not decided. Small changes in the local environment - tides, time of year, weather - and one side gains ground over the other.

The daily mark-making practice passed the "can-it-be-done-away-from-home" test. And many of the marks became about edge qualities.