Tag Archive for 'Salisbury'

Exhibition in Salisbury - Making History: Antiquaries in Britain 1707-2007

Published
by
Tom Goskar
on 3 October, 2008
in Museums
. 0 Comments

From Saturday 4th October 2008 until 3rd January 2009, Salisbury and South Wiltshire Museum will be home to the exhibition “Making History: Antiquaries in Britain 1707-2007“.

The exhibtion, presented in association with the Society of Antiquaries of London, explores the development of archaeology, from antiquarianism to the rise of modern professional archaeology. It features original works of art, manuscripts and artefacts from their wonderful collections.

Making History is a travelling exhibition, and after Salisbury it will move to Stoke on Trent, Sunderland, and Lincoln. It will be tailored to include relevant exhibits from each region, in addition to the exhibition’s core collection.

Following on from my work on the Making History exhibition in London at the Royal Academy last year, I have contributed a short animation to the Salisbury exhibition.

Entitled “Lasers and Light”, it contains some new footage generated from the Stonehenge LiDAR dataset, close-range laser scans of some bones (and skull) from the Amesbury Archer, and some laser scans of WWI and WWII graffiti carved into trees on Salisbury Plain. In the next week or so I will put it online and embed it here.

If you can make it to Salisbury and South Wiltshire Museum, Making History will certainly be worth a visit, and will give you an opportunity to explore the rest of this fabulous museum.

St George’s Day

Published
by
Tom Goskar
on 23 April, 2006
in Celebrations
. 0 Comments

Today (23rd April) is St George’s Day here in England. St George is the patron saint of England - but his feast day is not widely celebrated across England. That is, or course, you live in the cathedral city of Salisbury, where the they have a long tradition of celebrating his day in a big way.

Rather than write endless descriptions of the day, I set out with a camera to capture what was to be a quintessentially English day out. There is now a set on Flickr, should anyone be interested in what country towns get up to when they want to celebrate something (or someone)!

For basic info on St George and his feast day go to http://www.woodlands-junior.kent.sch.uk/customs/stgeorge.html

For the long-winded version, there is of course the entry for St George on Wikipedia.

Being Cornish (and proud, me ‘ansome), I think it’s great to celebrate your identity and your country. I think that St George’s Day has been avoided on the whole because of the appropriation of the flag (amongst other things) by the National Front, and it became linked with racism. I think it is time to reclaim St George’s Day as the wholesome celebration that it once was of national pride, and celebrating the country that we live in.

St Patrick’s Day, anyone?

In Cornwall, you’ll see the flag of St Piran (Cornwall’s patron saint) flying everywhere from the borders of the Tamar to Land’s End. There are big events to celebrate “Cornishness” not just on St Piran’s Day (5th March), but throughout the year. It’s healthy, it’s fun, it fosters good community relations. And it doesn’t exclude people who aren’t Cornish!

After experiencing St George’s Day in Salisbury, here’s to more places celebrating it!