Holker Hall Garden Festival


A year ago this weekend, Chris and I were traveling the English countryside and came to one of my favorite places we saw. We spent the day on the grounds of the beautiful Holker Hall in the north of England near Grange-over-Sands for the Holker Garden Festival. We read about it, and thought it sounded like the most British thing we could do: Flowers, show gardens, cheeses, sticky toffee pudding, and the most exciting, The Lamb National!


Adorable sheep in colored sweaters racing around a track and leaping over hurdles while being chased by a sheep dog! The audience favorite was the one nude sheep (gasp!)


Equally adorable English families came out to watch the festivities.

After the lambs finished their race, we watched the world famous Devil's Horsemen Stunt Team!


These amazing acrobats and their acrobatic horses can be seen in Game of Thrones, Braveheart, and a million other movies and TV shows.


Each horse and rider had its own personality, and it was amazing to see the intensely close bond that the horses shared with the riders. The animals were able to fall and play dead or feign a limp (for acting purposes).


The horses pranced in formation, moving deftly with barely any observable direction from the riders.


One of their biggest tricks was a race between two men straddling two horses each!


But the main event really was the people.


Well, the people AND their dogs, of course. So many characters! (We overheard that the little white poodle's name was Pipsy!)


For more of Evan Turk's travel illustration, check out the link below: 
Evan Turk Travel Illustration

Rainy England

 

It was a rainy day in New York City today, so I thought I'd post some drawings from some of the rainier days of my trip to England this summer. It rained for about half the trip, and although it impeded some drawing opportunities, I don't think I'd have had it any other way. The countryside just looked so much more English on the rainy days. The painting above is from the village of Ebrington in the Cotswolds, which is possibly one of the quaintest places on the planet. I started the painting during a brief break in the rain, but soon the rain began to pick up. The colors started to blend into one another, and everything took on a soft, squishy look that was much more what the village felt like. The mist dappled the watercolors and made them feel just like the moss that covered every surface.


Continuing the soft and squishy trend of the English countryside were the flocks of adorable sheep that dotted the hillsides. I painted these one very rainy morning from our bedroom in a local farm house that overlooked a field covered with sheep.


Sheep are hilarious looking animals, with silly, huggable shapes that seem predestined for nursery rooms and plush toys.


I couldn't get over how cute the lambs were. Often, two of them would run at their mother from a distance and begin suckling on either side with their tiny tails wagging.


The last rainy painting was from our journey to Highclere Castle, or as it's more commonly known, Downton Abbey. Like all good American tourists, my knowledge of English culture is dictated by a melodramatic soap opera with gorgeous production values! I have to say, TV show aside, the Highclere estate really is incredible. The house is surrounded by lush, rolling hillsides covered with dark forests, scurrying white lambs, and enormous bushes of rhododendrons and azaleas in sunset colors.

For more of Evan Turk's travel illustration, check out the link below: 

Morocco: The Eid


I'm back from a wonderful and intense trip to Morocco, and to start off I thought I'd post some drawings I did of the preparation for the Eid al-Adha which took place this Friday (Eid Mubarak!). The Eid is a major Islamic holiday that celebrates the story of Abraham and his willingness to sacrifice his son to God. In response to Abraham and his son Ishmael's willingness, he gave Abraham a ram to sacrifice in his son's place, and so Muslim people sacrifice an animal for their family as a celebration and remembrance of that sacrifice.

All throughout the trip we saw little glimmers of the coming holy day's approach: On bus rides we passed shepherds tending their flocks by the side of the road and trucks full of sheep being shuttled to town, and shopkeepers were more willing to give a good price to a blonde-haired, blue-eyed tourist to get a little extra money to buy a sheep. By the time we reached Fes near the end of our trip, the preparations were in full swing.


Outside the medina, sheep grazed in a nearby stable, chomping away and stumbling into each other, oblivious to their impending fate.

 
Families came to look at the sheep, and sometimes to select one for purchase.



Then came the parade of sheep down the tiny, maze-like alleyways of the medina. Sometimes they were rolled down the streets in carts, but often men picked up the hind legs and wheelbarrow-ed unruly rams down the hill, while children laughed and pulled their tails.

It was exciting to be able to see a part of Moroccan culture that tourists are not really a part of. The Moroccan/Tourist barrier sort of broke down when people talked about the Eid, and I got more of a feeling of what people were like outside the tourist industry. Little kids were just as excited to see the sheep as I was, and sat around watching me draw in the stable. Although the traditions and symbolism are different, the energy felt very much like the approach to Christmas with people shopping for last minute gifts, picking out the perfect Christmas tree, and the buzzing excitement of the coming celebration with family.