Stories of sailing and the sea .. The Jolie Brise, a new stamp collage in progress

The Oxfam shop in Stroud has some great bargains! I picked up an interesting book last week called "Jolie Brise - A Tall Ship's tale" by Robin Bryer.
Briefly, she was launched in 1913 at Le Havre and was in her time a pilot boat, and carried the Royal Mail, rescued the crew of a burning ship and won the Fastnet race three times!

The very first chapter starts with a quote I love, "What people really like are stories about sailing and the sea!"  I have found this to be so true.  Over the years, I've made several stamp collages based on boats and ships of many types and although most of these have now sailed off to new homes, you can still see them on my website www.rachelmarkwick.co.uk  under the SHIPS heading!
I thought it was rather appropriate that Jolie Brise at one time carried the Royal Mail, as my version is of course made from stamps!

I hope to have the picture finished in time for the  Open Studios festival in May in which I will be taking part, opening my studio along with many others in the Stroud area on Saturday 6th - Sunday 7th and Saturday 13th - Sunday 14th  from 11 - 6 . Hope to see you!

The animals went in two by two .. or seven by seven in some cases

Noah's Ark - my latest stamp collage - is still a work in progress and proving quite challenging in so many ways.   Faced with a pile of elephants ( stamps, that is), I 'm still  unsure whether to take two African elephants or two Indian (or Asian) elephants.  You can tell the difference by the size of their ears and the African elephants' ears are the largest!

  But having found an ancient and very large and heavy Bible, published in 1848,  I discover that it would be perfectly OK to take four elephants, two of each type! Not sure that I will though, as it depends on how much space I have on my paper!!
This version of the bible story says that Noah was to take 2 of every species of clean animals, which includes Horses, sheep, Dogs and cats,  but 7 of every species of unclean animals which includes Badgers, weasels and Rats!

I love the Bible's engraving showing the size and supposed design of the ark itself,  and  the list of animals that are to be loaded on board!

 Interesting reading regarding the many species per genus .. for example there is only one type of Giraffe - so simply 2 to be included, but two types of Hyena - spotted and striped, so 4 of these! And a total of 10 bears of five different species!

Luckily I found the missing Polar bear!
Clean and unclean animals are listed separately and include 19 different species of Squirrell (two ls) so 38 altogether!  If you want to read more, I suggest you find a very old bible ..
My own interpretation will of course be just that!!

The Bible referred to here is The Catholic Family Bible with notes and illustrations by the Rev. Geo, Leo Haydock - Dublin, London and Edinburgh - A. Fullarton and Co, 1848