Celebrating the Mischief of Rooks by Jackie Morris and Elly Morgan

Outside the tower two rookeries fill the air with rook chatter and clatter.

Tall trees and a village of nests and the conversations of corvids. Clever rooks, bright eyes with vain intelligence, and as evening falls, they swirl and fly, wings stretched wide to the world’s winds, then settle to tell the quiet lore of rook to their children.

Their sound isn’t the most melodious but it’s a truly memorable crescendo of bird communication that comes out of the rookery and reverberates round the Tower and the grounds at Oriel y Parc. To be in the presence of rooks is a sensory experience and it’s a privilege to take a bit of time to wander through the woodland to look, listen and wonder at these remarkable birds. Their incessant, raucous calls insist on being heard. In listening, you may be drawn into their bustling, interactive world—gently urged to notice them more closely, as Jackie and Elly do, inspiring this exhibition.

Inside the Tower, paintings and ceramics celebrate these once common birds. Artworks in watercolour, ink, and gold leaf are by the artist, Jackie Morris. The exhibition includes two paintings from The Book of Birds, co-created with Robert Macfarlane and launching with an exhibition at the Bodleian Library in Oxford. It is seven years in the making and birds continue to fascinate the artist. The clay rooks flying inside the Tower are Elly Morgan’s response to the real birds outside.