Going through the articles by Cordelia Oliver, and
photographs taken by George Oliver is proving to be a fascinating and
enlightening experience. At the moment I am working through the articles by
Cordelia that review exhibitions, performances, events etc. and I am
beginning to get a feel for the person behind them. I can tell you, she does
not pull her punches. The brilliant thing about them is the simple frank
appraisal given without any kind of pandering or bias, seemingly to
either friend or foe. It has already been mentioned that Cordelia played a key
role in the set up of the Third Eye Centre and although I have not yet reached
the year when the Centre opened (I am currently still in 1970), I am looking forward to seeing whether her reviews begin to reflect its approach.
For those interested, a good obituary for Cordelia can be
found on The Guardian website here, http://www.guardian.co.uk/artanddesign/2010/jan/26/cordelia-oliver-obituary
and on the Scotsman website here,
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| Some of the boxes I will be working my way through. |
It is only recently that I have started looking at the
photographs taken by George Oliver and there is much work to be done judging by
these boxes. Fabulous hairstyles aside, these photos have already given me an
insight into the unusual and diverse activities that took place at the Third
Eye Centre. Below you will see one of the first photos I came across, the
ribbon cutting at the opening of the Third Eye. Stay posted for more updates.
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| 'The George and Cordelia Oliver Collection' |
One of the loveliest examples of the way that the activities at the Third Eye fed into Cordelia and George's own life and home was the gold paper that they used as wallpaper into their dining room in Pollokshields. This was left over from some christmas event at Third Eye. It would be great if you could find an image that explained quite what. Cordelia and George patiently pasted it sheet by sheet into wallpaper that lasted some 30 years!
ReplyDeleteThat sounds fantastic! I can tell you I have not yet come across an image of that, although the majority of photographs I have seen have been of the Third Eye Centre and its events, excluding George and Cordelia entirely. However I still have a considerable number of boxes to sift through, if I strike gold I will be sure to post the image for you!
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