Isaac Rosenberg, Marseilles, Lausanne

Photo of me painting in my studio during the Phoenix Open in October 2007. Photo credit: David Flindall.

I'm currently working on a new artists book inspired by the poems of Isaac Rosenberg. I hope to have some details of this ready for the Oxford Fine Press Book Fair at Oxford Brooks University on Sat 3rd and Sun 4th November, and certainly by the London Artists Book Fair (LAB'07) at the ICA at the end of November. I'll have some speciment pages of text and images, and a specification, to look at.

I'll also be showing my existing artists books:

Kings Cross (2004)

Thames - The London River (2005)

Afghanistan - A Journey (2007)

and my smaller book about my Willows project (Willow/Wilg/Weide/Saule, 2007).

You can find out more about these books and projects elsewhere in my blog.

MARSEILLE & LAUSANNE

With Carolyn Trant (Parvenu Press), I recently travelled to Marseille for the annual book fair, which had a big artist books section organised by Atelier Vis-a-Vis, where we both had stands at the 'English Desk' showing our own artists books. Atelier Vis-a-Vis bought work from both of us, and in addition I sold a copy of my Afganistan-A Jouney book to a visitor to the fair. It was great to be able to visit Atelier Vis-a-Vis and hear of their incredibly ambitious plans for the future, including a new art school with 150 printing presses! What an amazing place for artists Marseille is! Why can't Britain be like this?

Marseille was wonderful - particularly the old part of the city on the Butte des Moulins, the Panier and Lenche districts, and of course the Bar de la Marine. The town museum by the Bourse was particularly good, with impressive displays, models and reconstructions of the history and archaeolgy of the city - Roman ships, amphorae filled with sardines and wine, a huge jar of grain, potteries, etc. Glorious sunshine most days, but a cold wind announcing the onset of autumn if not winter. Great restaurants here - particularly if you like fish. Travel by Eurostar and TGV as we did and (provided its daylight) you see a lot of the wonderful French countryside.

From Marseille we took the TGV to Geneva and changed for Lausanne, where we arrived in a freezing wind and stayed in the Backpacker Guesthouse with a wonderful 4th floor view of the historic railway station. In Lausanne we found, or were taken to, all the right places, including the Musee de l'Art Brut, the Romand restaurant, the Maharajah's Punjabi restaurant, and an Erotic Cabinet in a bookshop and art gallery. Our host in Lausanne was Stephane Fretz, of Art and Fiction publishers, and we were privileged to see the Art and Fiction office and studio and meet Stephane's colleagues there.

After this it was TGV back to Paris and a congested and claustrophobic Eurostar (with several non-working loos) to London. Now for the Oxford book fair! (and the LAB'07!).

Peter Chasseaud (Altazimuth Press) at Artists Book Fairs 2007

My studio in Brighton (Phoenix Arts Asociation, next to The Level and St Peter's Church) will be open to the public Fri 12 (5-8), Sat 13 (1-9) - Sun 14 (1-5) October 2007 (Phoenix Open weekend: www.phoenixarts.org). You can see my paintings and artists boks there, and also a new mini-installation relating to my new 'dark desires' project. I will be there on the Saturday and Sunday.

I will be showing my Kings Cross, Thames - The London River, Afghanistan - A Journey, and Ypres Willows artists books at the following artists book fairs this autumn (2007):

Marseille (20-21 October)

UK Fine Press Book Fair (Oxford Brooks University, 3-4 November)

LAB 07 (ICA, London, 23-25 November): link to Marcus Campbell/LAB 07 website:
http://www.marcuscampbell.co.uk/

Peter Chasseaud drawing at Ploegsteert, Belgium

A photo of me drawing a panorama at Ultimo Crater, Ploegsteert, Belgium, while working as artist in residence on the archaeological dig in July/August 2007.


Photo courtesy of Joanna Ramsay.

Peter Chasseaud working at Ploegsteert, Belgium

Two photos of me drawing at the Ploegsteert site in July/August 2007. Both photos courtesy of Richard Osgood. The top photo was taken looking south over Ultimo Crater. I am sitting on the southern lip of the crater, looking south over Factory Farm. The Bottom photo shows me sitting at the north-east lip of Ultimo Crater, making a panorama drawing of the view to the east towards Warneton. I am talking to Martin Brown who, with Richard Osgood, organised the dig.

Peter Chasseaud, Ploegsteert images 2007

Images drawn by Peter Chasseaud at St Yvon, Ploegsteert, Belgium, while working as artist in residence at the archaeological dig there in July-August 2007.

Pillars of Fire: the Trench 122 mines, 7 June 1917. Ultimo Trench on the left and Factory Farm (Ultra Trench) on the right. Copyright Peter Chasseaud 2007.




Below: Pollard Willow, Factory Farm. An old willow tree, regenerated survivor of the First World War. Copyright Peter Chasseaud 2007.

Wotan at Ultimo Crater; Sir John Tomlinson visits the 1914-18 archaeological site

Wotan at Ultimo Crater. Taking a break from my landscape work at the dig, on Tuesday 31st July I showed my friends Sir John and Lady Moya Tomlinson, with their daughter Abi, around the Factory Farm and Ultimo Crater sites. Later we visited Tyne Cot cemetery at Passchendaele, and they also satyed on to attend the Last Post ceremony at the Menin Gate before crossing to England.

Sir John Tomlinson at Ultimo Crater, St Yvon, Ploegsteert; 31st July 2007. Photograph courtesy of Martin Brown.

Peter Chasseaud artist in residence at Ploegsteert, Belgium

I will be in Belgium from 28 July to 4 August 2007 (apart from a quick return to England for 1 August to see Tristan and Isolde at Glyndebourne), at St Yvon near Ploegsteert, as artist in residence at an archaeological dig run by a group called No Mans Land.

The dig is just east of Ploegsteert Wood, a place I recently visited as part of my Willows project (see elsewhere in this blog). It focuses on the British and German front line trenches of 1914-1917, the 'no man's land' between them, and two huge mine craters blown in 1917 at Factory Farm and Ultimo Trench.

To the artist and writer Davis Jones, who served in this sector with the 'flash-spotters' of 2nd Field Survey Company, Royal Engineers, Ploegsteert (and also the Ypres Salient) was the mythical 'Broceliande' of the Arthurian legends. The job of the 'flash-spotters' was to locate enemy artillery batteries by taking intersections on their flashes when they fired. They relied on elevation to gain observation from church towers, windmills, hills, etc. In this area the great eminence of the Kemmelberg was vital for British observation, and also the lesser heights of Hill 63 and the hill at Neuve Eglise.

Ploegsteert Wood was an incredible warren of tracks, dugouts, headquarters, billets, reserve trenches (like the dugouts built above ground level as sandbag breastworks to keep above the high water-table). The clay soil in Flanders drains very poorly, and water (and related willow trees) is a significant landscape feature.

Visible and invisible:
I shall be making a close study of the landscape, including elements of visibility and intervisibility. I shall also bear in mind the invisible - the trenches near the surface, some of which the archaeologists will reveal, and the mine shafts and galleries which lie much deeper.

The air photo (conventional orientation with north at the top), taken in June 1915, shows the opposing trench lines with no man's land in between. Ploegsteert Wood is on the left, and at the top are the moated farms known to the British as Hull's Burnt Farm (left, to the west of the British front line) and Factory Farm (right, with the German front line trench running through it).