I just heard today that I have had 2 artworks accepted into the Swansea Open exhibition, running from December the 3rd to January the 6th. It’s returned after a gap of about 5 years, while the Glynn Vivian Art Gallery was closed and being refurbished, and it’s great to see it back. I’m chuffed to bits as Swansea is full of talented artists and the competition is stiff.
I submitted two monotypes of the Mari Lwyd, based on drawings I did in my sketchbook at the end of last year. The Mari Lwyd is an ancient Welsh tradition, where groups of revellers wander the streets and pubs accompanied by a life size puppet constructed around a decorated horse’s skull. It may hark back to the worship of the Celtic horse goddess, Epona.
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Congratulations! I’d love to see the exhibition.
Thanks Sarah 😀
Great!
Thanks Judith
Congrats, Rosie! Nice work. I have seen the Mari Lwyd being performed at St Fagans. Fascinating.
Thank you. It’s great to see the tradition returning
👍
Congratulations! Your monotypes of the Mari Lywd are great – so glad they will reach a new audience.
Thank you, it’s going through a revival after almost dying out, so glad to be part of spreading the word ☺
Congratulations! Edgy work.
Thanks Judith. The Mari Lwyd had almost died out because of Christian persecution but has been making a revival over the past decade or so. I hope to go out with one or two of them again this end of year 🙂
Congratulations!!! ❤
Thanks Rachel. The Mari Lwyd is one of those ancient traditions connected with the Faerie and the blurring of the boundaries between the worlds. We call Faerie Y Tylwyth Teg in the language of Cymraeg (Welsh)
Congratulations!!! Is Mari Lwyd similar to the hobby horse – has it similar origins?
Thanks Lois. I’m not sure, I think they may both, along with the chalk horses on the landscape, hark back to Celtic or other ancient traditions.Mari Lwyd comes out around the Winter Solstice to New Year, I think Hobby Horse may be connected with the Mayday (Beltane?) festival, but I’m not sure. Almost certainly echoes from a very ancient Britain though 🙂
So fascinating isn’t it… even if we don’t and can never know! I haven’t yet had a hobby horse in one of my novels… even though when I was at junior school I was the hobby horse… hmmmm…
Thanks for the inspiration, and congratulations once again – when is the show?
Was that a Mayday thing at school? There was never a hobby horse tradition here as far as I know, and the Mari Lwyd had just about disappeared because of Christian persecution, but it’s been making a good revival over the past decade or so. I saw one of the Maris in a Unitarian chapel last year.
The hobby horse was part of a country dancing festival for all the junior schools in the area – I was so hopeless as dancing but a great enthusiast so I was the hobby horse… there must be a story for me to write here, mustn’t there!!
I had the guy who is our local Mari Lwyd round for Sunday lunch and he said that Hobby Horse and Mari Lwyd have simular ancient roots and also spoke of Hodder or Hodden Horse in Kent which may be a reference to Odin. Morris Dancing has a similar horse, all manifestations of a very old tradition echoing down from the ancestors. A story would be good, would it be a spooky one?
I must look into it more… And yes a story, sinister and unsettling… Maybe because I was the Hobby Horse as a child it still has power over me which I don’t even realise….
I think there may be a lot of stuff lurking in the folk memory about these creatures ….