Tulse Luper arranged all these drawings in order for me one Monday afternoon when he heard that I was ill.
This was one of the drawings, in fact, he'd given me himself. It's one of a pair, though he told me not to bother to look for the other one.
These two drawings I had received anonymously on different occasions through the post.
This one I'd bought. I remember it cost me very little.
And these two were stolen though not by me. I was just the receiver.
This one I copied from a drawing at Bridsaw.
And this one I did steal - from the man who looked after the owls at the Amsterdam Zoo.
These two were given to me, probably as a birthday present.
Tulse Luper came back about eleven in the evening and told me that this drawing was probably the one I would need first.
So begins Colin Cantlie's narration for this amazing 1978 Peter Greenaway film in which the camera travels across a series of drawings - or maps as they are referred to - which we initially see en masse located in a gallery space before being emmersed in 40 minutes of ink and watercolour.
As the film progresses, there are increasingly frequent cut-ins of scenes of birds; the film's full title being 'A walk through H: The reincarnation of an ornithologist'. The wonderful score is by Michael Nyman, with a shorter version of the piece appearing on the Les Disques du Crepuscule compilation 'From Brussels with Love'.
