Even more Memories

Blurry recollections

The art department undoubtedly had the most bohemian of Saint Matthias students, although I expect they would seem quite tame compared to some more radical student bodies; we were at Matthias, a C of E college and clearly we could not be seen to let the place down. Never-the-less the lecturers were a fine bunch of men. Head of Department was the wonderful Roy Dunlop who was debonair and would wander round telling everyone how much he liked what they were doing, under him were Tom Wanless, a fine painter in his own right, who taught what would be known today as graphics but we called printmaking, Dick Le Feuvre who taught sculpture and was a delightful bloke if somewhat vague. On one occasion he introduced some of his seven children to the group and had to ask them to remind him of their names. He once came upon me late at night in the studios experimenting with action painting. "That's quite some mess you're making" , he observed, "but at least its an interesting mess." What a lovely man! The other member of the art staff I remember was Peter Swann who used to swan around the studios wearing a blue blazer, open necked shirt and a spotted red neck scarf, The male students admired him for his style and the females for other reasons. His specialism was painting. One person I admired greatly was Gordon Strong who was in his final year when I arrived, his shaped canvases were years ahead of anything I could do. The art block was on the south side of the college housed in some of the older buildings, it was quite beautiful from outside. Dick's sculpture studio was on the ground floor and the painting and printing areas were up a stone stairway. Alan Sopp, Chris Meechan and I spent many happy hours in there working, often after dark. I remember one experiment we did that involved dropping paint from a first floor window onto a canvas on the ground outside, it produced, as Dick would say, an interesting piece. On odd occasions we would run out of surfaces on which to make an artistic statement, (or mess), and we would happily wander down the Fishponds road to a timber merchants where we would cadge pieces of hardboard and other materials. Towards the end of the course the three of us held an exhibition in the Student Union Hut and even managed to sell some of the work we had done. It is interesting to note that I can remember my time in the art department far more clearly than I remember the philosophy of education lectures we had to sit through. Bristol itself was a fabulous playground to a teenager like myself, who had led a fairly closeted existence. One could, if one wished, walk all the way from Fishponds to the city centre although it seemed a long way and we usually scrounged a lift from someone. I walked it a few times and in fact I still sometimes dream about it. Most of the time I went to Clifton as it was a pretty hip area with lots of little shops selling Tiger Balm, beads and records. Interestingly it hasn't changed all that much and the shops there still sell Tiger Balm, beads and records. Many of Clifton's pubs were popular with students and I can remember going to one such to see Keith Christmas perform, sadly I didn't catch the end of his set as I was outside throwing up the rough scrumpy I had been drinking all evening. There is another memory, scrump was very cheap as I remember but if you got the top of the barrel it was half price. This was because it had wasp wings, bits of insects and leaves floating about in it. No wonder so many of us grew handsome moustaches that acted as a sort of filter. Another popular venue was the Colston Hall. I saw several bands there but the stand out one for me was Pink Floyd who had just released Ummagumma and were really freaky. The gig was a sell out and Floyd were fantastic. In the middle of the evening they performed a piece called Creatures from the Deep which had a lot of swirling keyboards and was overlaid with the band's famous light show. A fog, created with CO2, descended and out of it emerged a couple of blokes wearing rubber costumes and masks but also waving large appendages from which spurted foamy water. Most of the audience were so spaced out they didn't bat an eyelid although some of the ladies showed a passing interest. Later on I saw Steeleye Span perform their second album, Please to See the King. I remember the whole audience getting to their feet dancing and jigging when they went into a set of jigs and reels. ( I recently saw the band for a second time some 35 years later and they are still a superb act, even if the audiences are a little more restrained!) One of the funniest acts I was fortunate to see were the Bonzo Dog Doo-Dah Band fronted by the wonderfully eccentric Vivian Stanshall performing at Bristol University. During the student protests in 1970 I went to a sit-in at Bristol university with Sue Roberts and several other members of the student union and who should turn up there but Roy Harper who performed an acoustic set for the students who had barricaded themselves inside. Back at college we had many fine performers, amongst them Adge Cutler and the Wurzels long before they did the inane Combine Harvester song, they belted out material like When the Common Market comes to Stanton Drew, Virtute et Industrial, (Bristol's motto), Dont Tell I Tell Ee and Drink Up Thee Cider. Adge himself was a likeable chap who was willing to chat with students like myself and had no side on him. He was a fast car man and it was this pastime that eventually killed him. Fred Wedlock was a firm favourite at college and I still have two of his albums in the loft, The Folker and Frollics. He was a great raconteur and teller of jokes with which he interspersed his repertoire of songs, mostly humorous and occasionally serious. The Folker, even now, makes me smile. To the tune of The Boxer by Simon and Garfunkel, Fred would sing, "Asking twenty plus expenses I came looking for a gig but I got no offers, just a come on from a groupie up in Clifton. I do declare, I was feeling rather randy so I had her then and there." Again, he was a smashing bloke who I think I am correct in saying played soccer for the college once when we were short. There were, of course, many others whom I have long since forgotten but the ones I can remember must have been the ones who made a real impression on me that lasted until this day.