Wake up, be bright, be golden and light

It was the loveliest of coincidences that in April 2016 I happened to be in London for work and the exhibition, "The Clangers, Bagpuss & Co." was on at the Young V&A in Bethnal Green.  They were all there: the moon-dwelling Clangers and x-rays showing their wire armatures; we had various cut-out Joneses the Steam and Ivors the Engine, and long strips of landscape artwork; there were equally cut-out Noggin the Nog and Nogbad the Bad characters.  In the centre display case was the entire cast of Bagpuss, along with special items like Emily's dress, the mouse organ, and the ballerina's shoe that the mice rowed across the floor.

There was some artwork for sale, too.  Peter Firmin, who made most of the puppets and watercolours for Smallfilms, moved onto linocutting and engraving after he finished with television and animation.  For the exhibition he had produced four or five special linocut designs, all featuring the titular furry catpuss, and each was limited to 200 prints.  I couldn't not buy one.