The Cautionary Tale of Gentleman Jim and his Three Daughters
This book and puppets were developed as part of a project at the Lancashire Archives. The brief was to produce work, inspired by their collection of contemporary records and printed ephemera relating to Joseph Livesey and the Teetotal movement.
My response to this project developed down two separate strands. During my initial research in the archives I came across poems written about various teetotal movement meetings and also a humorous (or so it seemed to me) licence awarded to the personification of John Barleycorn exploring the harm this person was licensed to do. Morally improving literature was a common element in children’s literature during this era (Hilaire Belloc’s Cautionary Tales are a funny, affectionate reflection of this). I decided to write my own Teetotal Tale. But I am primarily a visual artist and as a printmaker I am interested in printmaking methods The development of chromolithographic printing in the Victorian era meant the start of relatively cheap colour printing leading to the proliferation of children’s books, board games and printed ephemera. The Teetotal movement made use of this technology in their printed ephemera (for example in their membership certificates for the band of hope). I decided to use colour separation monoprinting (a method of printing by hand which is similar in effect to chromolithography) to produce characters from the tale I was writting The story book and the puppet characters are packaged together as a children’s toy or gift |
Copyright 2019 Jac Balmer | All Rights Reserved