It was a real joy to return again this year to make Tagtool drawings at the Floating Castle Festival at beautiful Grad Sneznik . On Thursday 26 July, the first evening of the festival, the Israeli band Heylala that I made drawings for last year were performing. This concert was to be broadcast on Slovenian TV and I made several different drawings on the castle to accompany the songs in their programme.
Friday 27 July was the night of the lunar eclipse and in the dark night sky at the castle it was a most impressive sight. No less impressive was the music at the Etno Histeria orchestra concert and moon party held in the big cupola tent that followed. I started to draw this underwater fantasy scene while the tent was closed and the audience was gathering outside waiting for the party to begin…
…then the circus ‘divers’ climbed up and drew back the canvas so that these beautiful giant puppets could make a ceremonial entrance and the orchestra started to play.
There were so many people that the audience quickly filled the cupola and spilled out into the darkness of the field outside. I didn’t realise that somehow in the crush the red button on my Tagtool had been pushed…..with the inevitable result that the underwater fantasy that I had drawn so carefully disappeared completely just as the orchestra started to play. I was very upset and had to make another watery image very, very quickly – but I needn’t have worried, as afterwards someone said that the people who were standing outside watching the scene shining through the canvas thought this was a planned part of the performance!
Below are some of the other images that I drew to accompany the eclipse party concert.
Saturday night was the Floating Castle ‘grand finale’ with the concert at the lake and, as last year, a huge audience gathered expectantly in the darkness.
In my drawings I tried to reflect the ‘watery’ theme of this year’s festival, with divers, fish and other deep sea creatures. Adding to the atmosphere on the left of the photo above you can see a deep sea creature climbing out of the water. This eye-catching installation was made by a group of festival volunteers (with a little help from Dima and Barry, who miraculously managed to assemble it all on the tiny island of stones in the lake – without falling into the water!).
Below here is a daytime view of the completed installation…
To end the evening concert I drew these jellyfish and also a Loch Ness monster.
In the daytime when I wasn’t drawing I was able to enjoy the inspiring music and puppetry that makes this festival such a special event – and a most memorable summer holiday!
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