MOSAIC OF LIFE

MOSAIC OF LIFE Kate Thompson

When we came up with the idea of making a mosaic in our postage stamp sized courtyard garden in Southsea, we had little idea of the joy and full-on stand-up rows that would ensue.

Sitting back this week enjoying the sunshine and listening to the tinkling of the water from the fountain, I can fully appreciate the colourful backdrop we have created around our pond. There are shells, old tiles, smashed crockery, funny faces and even delightful blue and white casserole lids are stuck on the wall. At the water line there are mirror shards that glitter and reflect the water below.

Collecting the stuff that would be part of our mosaic was great fun and involved much mooching in charity shops to find just the right piece. Before long we had a couple of trunk loads of bits and pieces. My sister stumbled across a fantastic haul of tiles while out on a walk in the depths of Dorset and manfully staggered back to her car with bags filled with the ceramic booty. Meanwhile I had been studying Kaffe Fassett’s visual treat of a book, with ideas for mosaic projects large and small. I found myself particularly drawn to the images of his back

garden where every last inch is covered in jewel coloured ceramic snippets. In a previous life I ran an art cafe and created a giant grape vine to adorn the front of the building made out of papier mache for the grapes and pairs of tights stuffed with newspaper for the tendrils - so I’m happy to think big. Our snapper friend Julian came for socially distanced coffee recently and declared we were well on the way to becoming like Nek Chand who created an amazing sculpture garden in India that covers 40 acres, completely built from industrial and home waste. ‘If only we had the space’, I mused and I could see my ever patient partner, Paul, starting to twitch nervously as he’d have to do the dirty work, while I offer sound advice and encouraging words. We started sticking bits of smashed crockery and tiles to the wall in the midst of a heatwave. Paul crammed his 6ft 3 frame into the corner pond as he attempted to attach items to the wall with a concrete based mix, with the consistency of over-cooked porridge. Inevitably these sticking sessions would end in tantrums - as fast as the stuff stuck to the wall, gravity would get involved and bits of cups, plates and tiles would slide slowly down the wall to litter the bottom of the pond. Eventually it would all get too much for Paul and in a hail of expletives, he would extricate himself from the pond and storm off inside. Many’s the time I was left to quite literally pick up the pieces, coaxing bits of pottery back into position and jamming sticks against it to hold it in place. Fearful the mosaic could bring our relationship to an abrupt end, I suggested a trip to Fishbourne palace near Chichester to find out how those masters of mosaics, the Romans, did it.

We marvelled at the designs created all those years ago and listened intently for any tips that might help us to make sense of our own mosaic - and salvage the broken pieces of our love. Eventually I was able to ask my burning question to the expert who was showing us around. “How did the Romans stick mosaics to the walls?” I pleaded. The answer is simple - they didn’t. Turns out the Romans would make mosaic panels on the flat floor and then attach these to the walls once they were dry. With this new, but ancient knowledge, we took a deep breath and managed to finish the mosaic. A couple of years on, the memory of the pond mosaic has eased to the extent we are talking about extending the visual treat to the courtyard floor … what could possibly go wrong?

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IT’S BEEN MANY A YEAR SINCE SOUTHSEA HAD ITS VERY OWN INDEPENDENT, NEW BOOKSHOP. PHIL AND MEL OF PIGEON BOOKS GIVE A BRIEF DESCRIPTION OF THEIR BACK STORY AND PLANS FOR THE FUTURE... “A fter a year of bringing our little travelling pop-up bookshop to wherever we could find it a temporary home, we’re delighted to say we’ve finally settled somewhere permanent - you’ll be able to find us at 1 Albert Road, open Monday to Saturday.

We still have the same great selection of fiction, both contemporary and classic, general nonfiction, diverse children’s books, LGBTQ+ fiction and non-fiction, graphic novels and much more - and of course we will order in anything that we don’t have on the shelves. 2020 has been an interesting year, and nothing has quite gone according to plan - but we’ve done our very best to create a bright, safe, welcoming space to get away from the world for a little while and a small but carefully-curated range of books with something for everyone. We’ve still got plenty of fun events in the pipeline - and as soon as we can find a way to do things safely, watch this space for news of book clubs, readings and author events.”