Claude Debussy (on the left) and Igor Stravinsky in Debussy’s office with the Great Wave off Kanagawa on the wall.
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Suddenly I read …the size of the print ‘The great wave off Kanagawa’ is 25.7 * 37.8 cms. Well, if you don’t give up your search in the end you will find it.
I am not disappointed, not relieved but I have a kind of an uncomfortable feeling. What’s next. I have found almost sixty variations of the size Oban and now I can add a new variation and I know this is the one I was looking for.
No, it is not. I looked on the website of the Metropolitan Museum of Art in New York which has a print in the collection and they say it is 25.7 * 37.9.
That’s a relief. Nothing’s for sure in life.
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Oban is a harbour from which you can make a boattrip to several islands of the Inner and Outer Hebrides. This inspired several artists, as Jules Verne, Mendelsohn, Turner and Pink Floyd.
Jules Verne travelled from Oban by boat to Staffa, an island from the Hebrides on the westcoast of Scotland with the famous vulcanic Fingal’s Cave. This trip in 1859 inspired him to write the Green Ray. If the sun sinks behind the horizon, there is to be a green ray or lightning. The persons in the novel standing at the west of the island are once able to observe this phenomenom.
In 1829 Felix Mendelsohn visited Scotland and composed two pieces of music, the “Scottish Symphony” and the “Hebrides” Overture, Op. 26 (Fingals Cave).
In 1971 Pink Floyd produced for the film Zabriske Point the psycedelic song Fingal’s Cave, which was however later on not used in the film.
In 1831, Turner’s sketching trips for this project took him as far as the Highlands and the Western Isles of Scotland. He boarded a
steam boat, the ‘Maid of Morven’, which departed from Tobermory on the coast and ran between the Isles of Staffa and Iona. Turner
evidently ventured into the interior of Fingal’s Cave on the Isle of Staffa and made a number of pencil drawings in a sketchbook.
Edward Goodall made an engraving from the pencil drawing. It shows the impressive basalt rock formations in the chamber of the cave.
This image was chosen for the title page to volume ten of Scott’s Poetical Works.
Fingal’s Cave, Staffa, engraved by Edward Goodall 1834
Line engraving on paper
image: 123 x 80 mm
on paper, print
(from the website of TATE )
JMW Turner made an oilpainting called Fingal’s Cave, with the cave in stormy weather and a steamboat.
The cave was used by Matthew Barnew for his film Cremaster 3 for the opening and closing scenes.
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In the mailbox I found a wonderful surprise from a stranger. Someone sent me an old postcard with a picture of Oban Bay illuminated by the moon, with the following text:
I have not had time to have Verne T Lloyd practice this week. So don’t come unless you have started before you get this. Verne wants you to come so you can see his violin case but I guess it will keep another week.
Miss Fogg
Thank you very much stranger!
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So far I found thirtynine variations of the size Oban. What’s all this fuzz about size? Why do I want to research scale, size and it’s relation to what you see and feel? I feel like I am hiding behind all the figures I found while I just want to enjoy travelling. Maybe I just want to make a trip from Oban to Oban and even through Jules Verne to Tacita Dean to find out about my work? It is all about digging into facts and be open to find new ways maybe with the same outcome. The trip is more important than the destination. Confused what to do now.
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Tamara Dees 