I Have A Rash Between My Breasts

Locus Solus
(2)

I had planned to visit Brighton the day after our expedition Owling Manor, but I could not stay on my hunger. The image the old piano in the middle of the farm empty haunted me. I told Andrée how it would be great to film singing and photographed Barbara Hendrix at this location shifted, and she agreed with me: he had to go back! Lifted at 6 am, arrived at around 9, we had all day to have fun in the English countryside.

Under a bright sun that we arrived at Owling Manor. The exploration began with the garden, where nature has planted a field of many weeds and plants of all kinds.

This short course struck me by almost regularity of 8 shrubs growing around. They give a semblance of order in this jumble of greenery.

The red brick façade of the house is decorated with carved shamrocks.

view of the roof.

The first sight that was entering the house is the staircase where there is still a red carpet and skylights oval.

The remains of a past life are scattered in pieces at the option of passing visitors who, like us, are having a field day, moving objects according to their desires. Here, the tag "LIAR" is the only one in the house. It is even more strange to find it here because its double-meaning is oddly relevant. English "liar" means both "a liar" and "lying", and refers in turn to lie about the staging and the sleeper fantasy that has left her pumps at the foot of the bed ...

In the room next door, disorder Ambient is reflected in the mirror of a large wardrobe.

The kitchen has nothing to envy to the rest of the crowded parts of many objects of a bygone day, and whose disturbing presence seems to involve ourselves in a nearby, almost disturbing intimacy as it is dusty and chipped.

According to my research that the mansion belonged to a Franco-Hispanic English. The owner, the son of a English duchess, was born in 1913 in France. He married an Englishwoman in 1957 in London.

Potier, he was also a painter. His wife cultivated species of orchids at the manor. As for the house, it dates from 1904.

For reasons unknown, she was abandoned by its occupants and all its contents (pictures, dishes, furniture, clothing, etc ...). As if a drama or a sudden fad had forced the couple to leave without even packing his bags ...

The house and grounds are currently on sale for $ 3 million books and according to unconfirmed sources, the owner would still be alive would have 104 years! The couple had no children, returns to the mansion a niece although negligent.

Among all objects, books, pamphlets lying around, I found a French edition of 1932 of Impressions of Africa by Raymond Roussel (1877-1933). I think she was waiting. Of his time was a writer Raymond Roussel maligned and misunderstood. Oulipians and admired by the Surrealists, he was particularly fond of handling the "language of birds ", ie homophony. Anecdotally, there is a double-meaning in its title: "Impressions of money to," were published at the author. In preparation to deliver mine, I took them with me as a souvenir.

Greeting ...

We still had to Andree and me one last thing to do before leaving. Return to the abandoned farm.

Here the old piano as we had found the previous day to 20 hours. At a time when we went back the next day around 15 o'clock he was immersed in the dark. It took us half an hour to move a few meters and thus gain in brightness. The poor piano was so shattered that we were afraid that it turns into a pile of dust.

But we were motivated enough to mark the final score of this adventure, knowing that we do not soon come back to this place. In her velvet dress, Andree, singing is his finest classical arias, has given a kind of second life to old instrument whose voice had been silent for long. In the English countryside silent, the "Urbex Singer" had done a button!