Shoe Tales : a communal art project

Check the new website everyone!

2009-11-25T22:28:00.002Z

Hello one and all, shoe wearers and tellers,

Apologies for not keeping the blog up to date - but the new website for Shoe Tales is all up and running now so for any project updates please visit www.shoetales.co.uk

Hundreds of your fine postcards are on the website, and what a showcase this is!
There's also all the usual details of how to take part etc.

Shoe Tales is also on Facebook: join the group and invite your friends to get involved:
http://www.facebook.com/home.php?#/group.php?gid=11794230451&ref=ts

At some point I may revamp this blog - particularly as the plan is to create a book from all the art and stories sent in. But until then, keep checking facebook and the website, or email post@shoetales.co.uk if you have any thoughts....

Cheers everyone!
Sarah

The First Ever SHOETALES event: November 3rd 2008

2008-10-21T17:57:00.002+01:00

Hello there Shoe tellers,

Exciting news - the First Ever Shoetales event is fast approaching!
Whenabouts: Monday 3rd November 2008
Whereabouts: Milgi Lounge, 213 City Road, Roath, Cardiff CF243JD
Time: from 6pm

The postcards recieved so far will be on display for your perusal- so get yourself along to take a peek into everyone else's shoes and stories. And perhaps be inspired to create your own in the storytelling workshop!

What's actually happening on the night:

Wear or bring with you your most fabulous pair of shoes or a tale or two to tell. Everyone has shoe-anecdotes which will, by the end of the evening be made into fabulous stories.

There'll be a place to cut, stick, collage and fold paper to craft the story of your memorable / oldest / weird / borrowed / detested and inspired pair of shoes. All creative materials will be supplied and all stories, small large strange and ordinary, are welcomed.

There'll be a storytelling circle. There'll be giant paper mache shoes. With all this and more it'll be a night of communal craft to remember!

www.shoetales.co.uk

Additionally, the Shoetales website is currently being reinvented into something awesome. Soon it will incorporate both the old and original site and also this blog - so all information photos news and postcards will be in one glorious place.
Keep checking the above address for updates!

Any questions or suggestions please contact post@shoetales.co.uk

See you on the 3rd!

2008-09-24T09:59:00.006+01:00

What attracts you to a pair of shoes or makes you detest them? Colour? Cost? Character?

'Clogs - bought in Amsterdam and named 'Hope' and 'Resistance' - they inspired my involvement in non violent calm interventions. 'Hope' is often seen leading the way though 'resistance' a strong character resists protest and only comes out for creative transforming type events...'

'From that day on, I've only been able to dream 'What if?'

Do your shoes have personality? Where on earth have they been?

Borrowed Shoes in Andalucia

2008-09-07T11:00:00.000+01:00

This tale was told to me by a man I met by chance in town. I was sharing my sandwich with a gang of expectant pigeons, and he sat next to me and we chatted for a couple of hours. We put the world to rights: I asked him about his memorable shoes, and he told me this story.

Photographing the Rocio pilgrimage I decided to get wet and take pictures from the best viewpoint at the time- in the river that all of us, wagons, horses, tractors and all, were crossing. Not wanting to ruin my shoes I took them off and, tying the laces together, hurled them across the stream to the top of the opposite bank, BUT, they rolled down the bank, into the stream. Amid hoots of laughter and screams of derision my shoes vanished rapidly round the bend in the river, pursued by two small boys who failed to catch up with them....

That was that, I said to myself, and got into the river and carried on with my work!
Several hours later I emerged, well after most of the heavy wagons and horses had crossed over and well after almost all the beer and fino bottles on the far bank had been crushed under wheels and hooves, so I had a hard time of it picking my tenderfooted way up the road gouged by the wagons. I remember another photographer, mockingly chanting," Penitente, Penitente" , but he and Francois stayed by me helping me out of that situation, and we found something to sit down on. Everyone else of course had seen my shoes vanish and a kind lady managed to get her husband to give me a pair of his, which, overjoyed I then proceeded to wear for the next few extremely dusty miles.

That next day, reaching El Rocio, we were taken in and fed, and then offered a place in the stables of an aristo's mansion to rest our weary bones in our sleeping bags. I went out again in my borrowed new shoes to see what I could. Well, I got seriously involved in photographing a pair of dancers, very young, but really excellent flamenco masters- the best I had ever seen, who were giving an impromptu display in the courtyard of another house, with only a dozen or so of us there to watch the magic. And it was magic.

It was quite wonderful, but walking "home" in the dark I was mugged and robbed of all my equipment and money, my ID and most of my films, which were in a big can in my pocket. I was unconscious for several hours, waking, jacketless, in a pool of horse shit, of which I stank considerably. I staggered back to where we slept and Francois was already sleeping heavily. Fortunately there was a shower where we were and I washed myself really clean, including the bloody crack on my head, and shampooed my hair, until I felt just fine, and dry and very clean indeed. Of course I also had to wash my shirt and trousers very thoroughly, and the shoes that kind man had given me, which I dried off with a towel, as best I could, and placed at the foot of my sleeping bag bed on the floor. Feeling fully justified and utterly knackered, I lay down, and went to sleep, next to Francois on my right ,and the mule tethered across from us in the corner.

I didn't sleep the whole night long, or what was left of it, because, well, an odd noise awakened me. Perfectly backlit by the incoming dawn I gazed in wonder as the mule, our companion, angled his ass and directed a full and constant flow of urine, straight into my shoes.....

[PH, sent by email]

Kick off your shoes!

2008-08-27T23:15:00.003+01:00

Sometimes you just have to free yourself from your shoes, feel the world beneath your feet...

Back in the day! Shoes of our yesterdays

2008-08-20T16:54:00.004+01:00

Shoes of youth!
What were your childhood shoe adventures (shoe-ventures!) ?

Hi there, I don't know if you can use drawings, but these were my favourite school shoes when I was at school. AH, now Age 48 (sent via email)

Leave the anecotes of the shoes from your youth in the comments bit!!!

2008-08-09T12:03:00.004+01:00

A shoetale adventure in three parts...
one

two

three

Glasto-sandals

2008-07-26T10:54:00.004+01:00

Here's one for you, festival revellers...

My favourite pair of shoes (well actually they're sandals)
are a pair I found in the mud at glastonbury one year.
Lots of people had abandoned their shoes/trainers/etc
in the mud and this pair were looking particularly forlorn
(and they looked roughly my size) so I rescued them
from a muddy demise and took them home to the
washing-machine! They came up lovely and they're
the most comfortable pair of sandals I've ever had. I don't
know how old they were when I found them, but I've had
them about 5 years now and they're showing no sign
of falling apart.
I try to take them back to revisit Glastonbury every year
and we will be back there this month to visit their
old homestead and have a little dance!

But apart from my beloved sandals though,
I've always thought that human beings would be better
off WITHOUT feet! If we had wheels instead of
feet we wouldn't get bunions, ingrowing toenails,
blisters or sore feet. We wouldn't have to buy shoes,
socks, tights etc and would save a fortune and we would all
become much healthier. Journeys would be shorter and
greener and we wouldn't have to worry about whether
or not our shoes matched our outfits!

Do you have a pair of memorable festival shoes?
Send their story via post or email to Shoetales.
Or leave a comment below...

Welcome back...

2008-07-26T10:34:00.006+01:00

Oh hello there, how are you? Hope you're having a grand July. As you can see I've not uploaded many postcards over the last couple of weeks - Shoe tales went on an adventure to 2 festivals and befriended many a muddy boot and dusty flipflop! Meaning absence of internets...so.... it's all happening now! Here! Peruse some great stories below and check this space for further (more frequent) story additions. Wondeful, now without further ado let's get shoe-telling.

Cowboy boots

2008-07-07T23:23:00.003+01:00

Shoetales loves Doc Martins

2008-07-05T00:30:00.011+01:00

Docs Rock!

Do you have memorable Doc Martins?
Boots or shoes or flipflops -tell their story on a postcard.
Then simply mail your tale to Shoe tales (address to the right!)

...or email your anecdote: shoetales@thediff.net
Lovely.

Creative shoes...

2008-06-29T21:19:00.006+01:00

2008-06-23T08:57:00.002+01:00

Bargain!

2008-06-21T22:32:00.004+01:00

* * *

2008-06-19T23:44:00.004+01:00

Who else had the secret key shoes? They were ace.
What did you keep in the sole of yours?

2008-06-18T19:59:00.004+01:00

A slightly longer piece: some well travelled shoes.

Red Shoe fascination

2008-06-16T00:26:00.006+01:00

Click on the postcards to make them bigger.

2008-06-12T22:37:00.002+01:00

Revealing the tales

2008-06-11T01:14:00.005+01:00

Now: it's that time where it's neither yesterday nor tomorrow. About an hour past midnight- difficult to tell which time you're in. It's all at once very late, very early.
Cinderella is about to trip over her glass slippered feet in attempts to catch the last pumpkin bus home.
Brief interlude query glass slippers - bit dangerous eh, Miss Cinders? Shoes filled with magic, heels that could break into shards and stab your foot. That old fairy tale instance where girls put fashion above comfort.

So - I'm thinking, whilst tiptoe balancing upon the today-tomorrow cusp: I should upload a couple of postcards each day to this blog. Each day a new storyteller, a fresh pair of shoes brought to life by people, pens and postcards.
Or maybe just dump several big loads. A 'Here you go, have some Shoe tales.'
I think the first choice is far more enticing, romantic. So let's do this:

To continue onward from the first ten, here are three postcards. Three.
One for yesterday (10th), one all ready for tomorrow/today (11th) and a third for the melted time of neither today nor yesterday. The time of sleep. The dream time. Enjoy x

2008-06-09T19:56:00.000+01:00

So here you are

2008-06-09T19:33:00.000+01:00

Salutations and welcome to Shoe tales. Finally here at last, after much procrastination, is a space for stories of shoes to be gathered and shared. Postcards have travelled from as far as China carrying anecdotes of memorable footwear - take a look at them, take a trip into someone else's shoes.
Each story is unique, and also overlaps with those around it - the way these tales are told allow a peek into people's personalities. Shoes are revealing, enticing and ordinary - every pair of shoes has a story, just some haven't been spoken about yet. All kinds of shoes appear here - can you relate to any of these postcards?
Enjoy browsing these doodles and anecdotes. Jump on the Shoetales storywagon yourself - send in a postcard and see it here soon.