randoms

Walking down the magnificent valley to the lagoon which lies to the side of the winding river Dart - shining in the sun like an egg within the coils of a serpent - you glimpse through the reeds a number of upright pillars of stone rising out of the water, bringing visions of Carnak to mind, as though several of them had migrated from the flat open fields of Brittany and come to rest in Devon in the still waters of Sharpham, in the company of trees, shadows, reflections and ducks. When I went to Carnak I had a dream that the stones were 'points of consciousness' - a voice told me firmly - and here too the pillars are distinctly alive with thoughts and sensibilities and attitudes. There are seven of them standing together, each with their own point of view: at the centre is the stone pillar which culminates in the horned curve of the Moon, shedding its invisible light on the neighbouring stones of the Eye Goddess, The Horned God, The Horned Snake, The Phallus - double phallic, some might say, as the stones are phallic to begin with, sun-lovers to the Goddess whose shimmering waters receive and return their reflections continually.One of these stone figures has whirling circles of energy inscribed upon its side, in the tradition of the spiral and circular designs cut into the megalithic stones of Malta, New Grange and France. This is a piece full of paradoxes - both earthbound and skyward, timeless and temporal. Each granite stone comes from Dartmoor and weighs a ton and is held in place by 40 foot piles driven into the mud, yet the vibrant energy of the stone spires speaks of the ever-renewing tides of birth and death as eternity enters time. Even the lagoon itself is eloquent of an original wildness - trees left lying where they fell, rushes and nettles sprawling where they please - as though genially overlooked by the gentle but precise eye of Capability Brown who designed the estate.