Groggster

By Groggster

Going Batty Over A Starling Representation

Today I decided to go for another still life. I was looking for an image with a variety of both patterns and colours when I alighted upon this combination of a wonderfully stylised avian and flora representation, some sliver topped jars filled with pink glitter and a plastic rose.
When I take a still life I like to try and find out about, or make a story of, at least one of the objects in my image. In this instance it's the aforementioned stylised avian and flora representation which is on a card and is actually a design called Starlings at Heybridge Basin by Dora Batty (I did initially do a double take when I first saw the name as my mind instantly jumped to the be-wrinkled stockings wearing character  - warning niche reference coming up - from Last of The Summer Wine but of course that's Nora Batty!).
Dora Batty (1891 - 1966) was a British designer working in illustration, poster design, pottery and textiles in the first half of the 20th Century. She was one of the most prolific female artists commissioned by London Underground and London Transport, between 1921 and 1938, to design over 50 posters in a variety of different styles before going on create her own individual work across a range of mediums and teaching textile design for over 25 years at the Central School of Arts & Crafts (now Central St Martins) in London until she retired in 1958.
One of her pupils at the school was the designer Sir Terence Conran, who in an interview in 2001, recalled her as a "terrifically stern woman" but also that "the influence of such devoted teachers as Dora was remarkable".
She lived in Heybridge Basin for the last 30 years of her life, a picturesque Essex village located between Chelmer and Blackwater Navigation Canal and the Blackwater Estuary. It would have been a serene spot to unwind from the pressure of working in London. Batty named her cottage Starlings, the name referenced in the folk art design you can see in my image.
Her name hasn't quite achieved household status but many of her designs are still popular to this day and the posters she created for the London Underground and London Transport are still on display at the London Transport Museum.

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