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Hirtenlied/ Folding the Last Sheep: A Proposal for the Bundesgartenschau, Magdeburg
Hirtenlied/ Folding the Last Sheep: A Proposal for the Bundesgartenschau, Magdeburg
Hirtenlied/ Folding the Last Sheep: A Proposal for the Bundesgartenschau, Magdeburg

Hirtenlied/ Folding the Last Sheep: A Proposal for the Bundesgartenschau, Magdeburg

Artist (Nassau, Bahamas, 1925 - 2006)
Recipient (Aberdeen, Scotland, 1939 - 2022)
Printer (founded 1961)
Artist
Date1999
Object NameCard
Mediumcard, ink
ClassificationsPrints
DimensionsPaper Size: 18.5 x 17.5cm
AcquisitionPresented in 2010 by Joyce Laing OBE.
Copyright© Estate of Ian Hamilton Finlay
LocationView by Appointment - Aberdeen Treasure Hub
Object numberABDAG017574
About MeFolding card co-designed by Ian Hamilton Finlay, Pia Maria Simig, Thomas A Clark and Laurie Clark, printed on beige card by the Wild Hawthorn Press. It features the following text along with illustrations of a sheepfold:

(front)

a HIRTENLIED

Ein Vorschlag für die Bundesgartenschau, Magdeburg 1999

(inside)

b EINPFERCHEN
FOLDING (German translation follows.)

c DES LETZTEN
THE LAST

Intended as a contribution to a Bundesgartenschau established on what was one a military traning ground, this recreation of an old-fashioned sheepfold includes as a text the title of an etching (1850) by the English pastoral artist Samuel Palmer. The visitor is invited to open the latched gate and enter the secluded space within the sheepfold which, like the Palmer etching it recalls, stands in the pastoral tradition reaching back to Virgil and Theocritus. The structure is built in the traditional manner, using unworked already weathered stones. The works 'Shepherd's Song' - an alternative to 'Eclogue' - are inscribed on the gate.

d SCHAFES
SHEEP

Bibliographie
Folding the Last Sheep, Thomas A Clark und Laurie Clark, Moschatel Press
Samuel Palmer and 'The Ancients', Raymond Lister, Fitzwilliam Museum, Cambridge
The Illustration of William Blake for Thornton's Virgil, Nonesuch Press
Virgil, The Pastoral Poems, ubersetzt von EV Rieu, Penguin Classics
Pianostool Footnotes, Simon Cutts, The Jargon Society

This card is part of an archive that belonged to Joyce Laing, OBE. The artist, Ian Hamilton Finlay, was a personal friend and sent her an example of each new poem print and multiple as it was made.