Art in Action/self portrait

As ceridwen wanted to know more about this year's Art in Action I thought, now that I've recovered from the journey mania, I'd tell you:

The annual four-day event in the grounds of Waterperry House depends on a huge, dedicated commitment of volunteers (I've just invented that collective noun) to bring artists and the public into contact. Each art form/medium has its own marquee: painting, printmaking, sculpture, ceramics, textiles, wood, glass, metal... Many of the artists are at work, though probably not very effectively since they are constantly interrupted by visitors' questions. They will explain a reduction lino cut, how a woven scarf is pleated, how you make moulds for casting pewter from lego and plasticene... whatever you ask - it's an extraordinary sharing of expertise.

However, my mum and I were a bit underwhelmed by the first two marquees we visited so weren't asking questions but chatting. I told her the continuing sad saga of the necklace in the compost heap. Having retrieved and cleaned it, I wore it earlier this week but suddenly found it slithering down my front. I caught it, tightened the catch and put it back on but when I got home it had gone again. Who knows where... I decided I was doomed not to have it.

Then we got distracted in the ceramics marquee by the most elegant jars with pencil-thin necks. After watching John Stroomer throw one, we went to look more closely at the finished work. The glazes are covered in breathtaking crystalline forms - like the cross section of a lemon but tiny and exquisite. He fires at 1,300°C then cools the kiln and keeps it at 1,100°C which allows crystals to form in the glaze. We nearly decided that we were rich enough and sufficiently in need of pots to buy one, but reality prevailed. I'm cross that I was so mesmerised I didn't take any pictures. The best I can find on the web are Bottle and Platter  but these images don't do the work justice.

On to the wood marquee. Two years ago the Sylva Foundation felled a 222-year-old oak for its 'One Oak project' and is recording the uses all its parts are put to. My favourites were a table by Philip Koomen, sounding bowls (the one in this link isn't oak) by Tobias Kaye  and a curvaceous triple love-seat which I also also failed to photograph.

In the international marquee the tent-makers of Cairo were exhibiting their vibrant appliqués - samples here; I asked Turkish marbling artist Hikmet Barutçugil how he makes his detailed pictures, so he made a Turkish tulip and gave it to me; and at the Mali display I was admiring jewelry when... I saw a replica of my lost necklace! But new and without a dull coating of compost oxide. I know this sort of piece isn't rare; even so, I was astonished. So here's me, wearing a present from my kind mum - so that you can keep a look out for my lost one and so that Folkie can recognise me at WOMAD next weekend.

I asked the kind volunteer who rescued us from our travel disasters and gave us a lift towards Oxford why there were no photographers. 'Good question,' he said, 'suggest it for next year.'