EDINBURGH.- Lakes Culture, funded by the Arts Council and VisitEngland, is setting out its stall to establish the Lakes District, Cumbria, as the UK’s must visit rural culture destination. The project is already making great in roads, and the team are about to raise the tempo even more as they finalise arrangements for their latest arts happening ‘Lakes Ignite’. A programme designed to highlight the wealth of cultural events on offer across the region from April until 24 May.
As part of the programming ‘Lakes Ignite’ Artistic Curator, Aileen McEvoy, has pushed the boat out and commissioned four innovative artistic works based around the theme of imaginary journeys, designed to encourage you to get out and about, explore the area to and take in some of the region’s top cultural venues and happenings this spring.
One such piece is a special documentary film of a unique journey: Take Me Back To Manchester.
'Wombwell's Royal Number One' famous travelling menagerie closed in 1872 with all the animals sold by auction in Edinburgh. The Asian elephant Maharajah was purchased by the owners of Manchester’s Belle Vue Zoological Gardens. So far so good. It was planned to send him by train to Manchester, but this plan altered rapidly when he immediately wrecked his railway carriage. Thrown off the train, his keeper suggested that they should walk to Manchester, perhaps to secure a few extra days work, and this they did over the next ten days.
The tale of this epic walk has entered into folklore and from Wednesday 08 April 2015, Manchester based comic artist Oliver East will retrace the 200 mile walk, over the ten days (08-17 April 2015).
East will follow the route Maharajah took along the A7 and A6, he will not be accompanied by an elephant, but by his phenomenal imaginative, drawing and narrative skills. To challenge himself further Oliver will set his drawings in 1872. Oliver has researched the comprehensive written archives documenting the walk, looked at the care and welfare of animals in captivity in 1872 and also researched Victorian paintings and photographs of the route, held in local art/museum collections.
During the Cumbrian leg a special documentary film commissioned by the Lakes Culture ‘Lakes Ignite’ programme will captured by Cumbrian based film makers Dom Bush and Simon Sylvester. The pair will film this epic journey as it travels through the County taking in Carlisle, Penrith and Kendal. The film will then be shown at the Brockhole Visitor Centre in the Lake District from 08-17 May inclusive and also at the Toronto Comic Art Festival in 09 - 10 May 2015.
Day by Day:
• 08 April Edinburgh (Waverley Station) – Stow
• 09 April Stow - Hawick
• 10 April Hawick - Langholm
• 11 April Langholm - Carlisle
• 12 April Carlisle - Penrith
• 13 April Penrith - Kendal
• 14 April Kendal - Lancaster
• 15 April Lancaster - Preston
• 16 April Preston - Bolton
• 17 April Bolton - Manchester (Manchester Museum)
Take Me Back To Manchester will be the first time that Oliver has walked in another’s footsteps i.e. Maharajah and his keeper Lorenzo Lawrence and the first time he has attempted an historical approach. The walk in the spring of 1872 was a media sensation in its day and well documented in local papers; there are also a couple of paintings/drawings recording the event (one in Manchester Museum and one in Manchester Art Gallery).
Following the walk, Oliver will create a comic book Take Me Back To Manchester, which will be showcased at the Lakes International Comic Art Festival (LICAF) in October 2015 and some work in progress will be included as part of the LICAF Comic Art Pavilion at the Toronto Comic Art Festival in May 2015.
Oliver will also make 20 large scale drawings that will form the basis of an exhibition at Manchester Museum alongside the skeleton of Maharajah. The exhibition of Take Me Back To Manchester is pencilled in for early 2016.
Oliver East Comic Creator, said: ‘’It's a story that sits somewhere at the back of most Mancunian's memories without ever really knowing what happened. There is a lot written about Belle Vue Zoo itself, and Maharaja's life there, but little to nothing on the actual walk Lorenzo undertook, which makes it ripe to mine for linear narrative. The burgeoning relationship between animal trainer and animal, whilst undergoing such an epic trek is interesting to explore in itself, aside from the task of getting to Manchester.’’
