Angie Rogers Artist

GET INSPIRED

Connecting you to Landscape, Nature and The Wild.

Songs Of The Woodland.

Wishing you a very good day from Hebden Bridge and Calderdale where change is in the air.

Here the woods are singing both the song of late summer and the song of early autumn. It’s a kind of in-between time.

The leaf-mould is damp and fungi scent the glades with their mysterious perfumes.

Foliage is still mainly green but acorns and conkers are strewn in huge abundance on the forest floor.

2025 is a ‘Mast Year’ when there is an exceptionally high quantity of fruit and seeds produced by trees, especially Oaks. Walking In the woods yesterday I could hear a continuous light ‘rain’ of acorns falling as the breeze stirred the branches.

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Bringing The Outside In

It can be easy to overlook the beauty of things we take for granted. Maybe you haven’t really looked closely at acorns and oak leaves in a while. They have a kind of perfection even when slightly savaged by unknown creatures.
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On a cool windowsill or in a vase of water, a sprig of Oak can last long enough for you to enjoy their form and colours; the contrast between smooth acorn and knobbly cup brings delight.

And here are little Oak Apples, not fruit at all but galls, the manifestation of parasitic wasps. Through a chemical mechanism, the wasp ensures an Oak tree grows these abnormal forms to provide a micro habitat/safe nursery for the growing infant wasp!

Oak galls have historically been used to make iron gall ink. They contain tannin which in combination with rusty water makes a black ink. The Domesday Book and the 1215 Magna Carta were written with iron gall ink.

Apart from the mature Oaks’ sheer magnificence and beauty it’s the haven they provide for over 2000 wildlife species that makes them so important.

The Fortnight In September

Another book you may enjoy as an antidote to despair at the world situation. Nothing much happens. A 1930s family go on holiday for two weeks and then they go home. I know it sounds dreadfully mundane. But reconsider. An author of skill can reveal quotidian life to be full of touching moments and quietly nuanced philosophy. And don’t we find this in our real lives?

First published in 1931 The Fortnight In September is by RC Sherriff who was severely wounded at Ypres in 1917 so he knew all about suffering and the longing for home. Later he worked in Hollywood. If you have ever watched old black and white films such as The Invisible Man, Goodbye Mr Chips or The Dam Busters, he wrote or contributed to the scripts.
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A 1931 review in The Spectator sums-up the novel’s charm.

”Here is a subject which could have been treated satirically, cleverly, patronisingly, sentimentally. But Mr Sherriff comes to it fresh and makes it universal. There is more simple human goodness and understanding in this book than anything I have read for years”.

The Fortnight In September is published by Persephone Books Ltd, London. Their plain grey covers hide such colourful endpapers and bookmarks inside, usually contemporaneous with the period when the novel is set.

Something New I’m Making

Every artwork I make has a story. As a landscape artist living in Yorkshire my work is deeply influenced by my surroundings and by the seasons.

Sometimes when working on a project or a collection I have to break off and pay attention to more urgent tasks. And then when I go back to the original project I find the season has changed, or the feeling has gone and I can’t make progress.

At the end of 2024 I was excited to realise I could combine elements of two very long-dormant projects to make something just right. I sensed though that the idea best lent itself to the colours of autumn.

And so in January I challenged myself to wait until August and September time to work on and complete the small edition. I'm pleased to say I've been able to do this and am almost ready to release it into the world in October. A case of a sudden insight inspiring a tangible result.

I've taken a few photos along the way to show you my processes and the different tools I use.

Can you guess what kind of artwork it will be? I won't mention the title or it'll give the game away. I will say that it's a mini celebration of where I live and what makes it special to me and many others. Plus there's an intriguing interactive element to it too!

All will be revealed in the next Get Inspired email.

Email me your guess about this new artwork and whoever gets closest will receive by post (or collect from my studio if local) a small prize from me.

The next edition will be sent out in mid October instead of at the end of the month. A variety of reasons necessitate this so look out for the email earlier than usual.

Putting The Outside On

There are times when you feel stressed and have to be indoors and you want to listen to something but not TV or the radio or even music. But you don’t want total silence either.

If you have headphones, I can recommend trying a free podcast called Radio Lento.

Lento means ‘slow’ in Italian. This is how they describe what they have to offer:

“Surround yourself with somewhere else. Captured quiet from natural places. Put the ‘outside on’ with headphones.”

There’s no music or talking and no loops. The most recent one I listened to is number 281, episode 286, Night Rain In The Pyrenees. 65 minutes of tranquility.

​https://podcasts.apple.com/gb/podcast/radio-lento-podcast/id1505235189​
​here’s a screenshot. You can find it on other podcast platforms, not just Apple. The quality of the sound recording is outstanding.

Ripples

Thanks to the lovely supporters who wanted the Peacock butterflies, I was happy to see them fly off to new places. Thanks also to Rod, Janet, Kate and Annie who sent such nice messages. Your kindness and enthusiasm is greatly appreciated by me.

Janet sent me a wonderful video of Red Admiral butterflies feeding on purple scabious flowers. Here’s a still taken from it to show you, alongside an unusual shell Kate found in Thailand.
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Don't forget the next edition of Get Inspired will be sent out in mid October instead of at the end of the month.

I only want to be in your inbox if you find it valuable, so if you don't, please be a kind unsubscriber.

Better than bringing the outside in or putting the outside on is opening your front door and Going Outside Into Nature. So take every opportunity you can.

I almost forgot to say, that sad ankle I mentioned last time is vastly improved and I've even been back to the tricky stone clapper bridge, and walked a good few miles since then.
All the best,
Angie

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