Beatrice Leal unfortunately had to defer her SOAS talk about the glorious mosaics in Great mosque of Damascus. But when I took the opportunity to find out as much as i could about her work – some is here and here – she asked why I was interested.
So I am revisiting my first forest here – my first artistic forest that is.
This was initially shown as part of Jewyo Rhii and Jihyun Jung’s ‘mobile theatres’ at the Showroom.
I wanted to tell the beautiful story of my father’s death. Of course I love my dad very much – he was always an expert at living – and it turned out that he was an expert at dying as well!
So I started by sharing his last Black Run:
![On the left, a woman faces away from the audience and towards a projection of a man skiing fast](https://carolinemawer.com/wp-content/uploads/2022/01/003-black-run-on-metalphoric-theater-copy-400x283.jpg)
and how he stood up from his deathbed to ski in my arms.
![](https://carolinemawer.com/wp-content/uploads/2022/01/007-deathbed-skiing.jpg)
I told the story of how when my dad was so near death that he’d stopped talking, he got out of his bed – and stood up as if he was skiing.
I wanted to underline how we are all in a cycle of life. So I showed my dad’s heart as an acorn (they look kind of similar, i think!)
![](https://carolinemawer.com/wp-content/uploads/2022/01/009-small-acorn-on-wall-2-copy-2.jpg)
The acorn-heart cracked open to germinate with my tears as his heart stopped.
![](https://carolinemawer.com/wp-content/uploads/2022/01/008-small-heartbeat-with-sound-copy-400x337.jpg)
I’m including two performers, sound (of words and clapping), plus the lighting and projected images over time – in this 2d image.
This is where the Damascus mosaics come in
The acorn-heart geminated into a ‘tree’ derived derived from the superb Damascus mosaics.
![](https://carolinemawer.com/wp-content/uploads/2022/01/013-drawing-trees-DSC_0108-400x266.jpg)
And then, with all that warm water when I washed my dad’s body, the acorn-heart-Damascus-tree developed into a luscious fruiting forest.
I had immediately thought of the mosaics at Damascus as a perfect source for the most perfect forest – of course i wanted to make the best of all forests for my dad.
So I ‘borrowed’ some of the Damascus trees – and added some firs, to commemorate my dad’s great love for skiing in the Alps.
The last touch was to add some fruit from Iran – persimmon, pomegranates and dates
![](https://carolinemawer.com/wp-content/uploads/2022/01/018-fruit-forest-on-wall-scan-out-scaled.jpg)
But I only had one projector at the Showroom, – when a wrap around forest (like i wanted) obviously needs more.
So I managed to make a bigger and better version in the Wandsworth Fringe 2019 – with projections to the front and both sides of the lovely Tara Arts
![](https://carolinemawer.com/wp-content/uploads/2022/01/25-deathbed-skiing-flyer-1024x718.jpg)
I managed to give my dad a posthumous present – his last Black Run is actually a video (with permission, many thanks!) of a Graham Bell black run.
Graham was in the Olympics, and presented Ski Sunday – my dads fave TV viewing.
![](https://carolinemawer.com/wp-content/uploads/2022/01/33-Screenshot-2020-11-13-at-09.36.30-400x336.jpg)
![](https://carolinemawer.com/wp-content/uploads/2022/01/37-Screenshot-2020-11-13-at-10.11.47-400x322.jpg)
![](https://carolinemawer.com/wp-content/uploads/2022/01/mawer-3-in-my-Luscious-Fruiting-Forest_Deathbed-Skiing-perfomance-1024x708.jpg)
With a version of one of the mosaic trees in the glorious glorious Great Mosque of Damascus behind me