Our literary portrait exhibition opens on Monday for one week as part of the Worcestershire Literary Festival and there are twenty four portraits of key authors on show. Paul is showing watercolours of Salman Rushdie, Seamus Heaney, Martin Amis, Colm Toibin and Will Self , and I am showing portraits in oil or acrylic of Virginia Woolf, Carol Ann Duffy, Germaine Greer, Enid Blyton, Anita Brookner, Agatha Christie, Simone de Beauvoir, Laurie Anderson, Graham Greene, Evelyn Waugh, Dylan Thomas, Sir John Betjeman, Ezra Pound, Louis MacNeice, Laurie Lee, Ted Hughes, Edith Sitwell, V.S Pritchett, and Alan Bennett. Each portrait is accompanied by a quote either from the writer themself or from one of their works. I am delighted with the exhibition and would dearly love to show it at other literary festival in this country or abroad.
We were delighted at the opening of the exhibition to welcome from the Williamstown Literary Festival, Australia, Councillor Angela Altair who happened to be over in the UK for a visit. She was incredibly enthusiastic and complimentary about the exhibition depite being fresh off the plane.
The following evening she attended the official opening of the Literary Festival in front of the Mayor of Worcester and the Dean of Worcester Cathedral in the search for Worcestershire’s first Poet Laureate. All the contestants were great but the award finally went to Theo Theobald who I thought was brilliant, very funny and incredibly engaging. He reminded me of Harry Worth in both looks and delivery which just shows my age. One poem was inspired by a bottle of Worcestershire Sauce, and covered everything from culinary expertise to marital relationships; another was called, “I’ve fallen in love with the girl from H & M,” which had a hilarious punchline and had the Cathedral filled with laughter and applause, a rare feat. We were enthralled, he was a great choice, and the judges came up trumps. With real presence on stage he showed great originality in both poems and I for one will definitely go and hear him again as a newy converted fan. Well done, Theo!
Watch Sara talking about the festival on Youtube:
