National Screen and Sound Archive of Wales preserves and celebrates the sound and moving image heritage of Wales, making it accessible to a wide range of users for enjoyment and learning. Its film collection reflects every aspect of the nation’s social, cultural and working life across the 20th century, giving a fascinating insight into Welsh filmmaking, both amateur and professional.
This film is part of Free
Send Out Your Homing Pigeons Dai
What do pigeons want? Patience, punctuality and kindness, according to William Robinson of Rhymney who loves his birds.
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Overview
Patience, punctuality and kindness – that’s what pigeons require, says William Robinson, who has a cot full of the birds and lives in Rhymney, home town of poet Idris Davies whose words are fused with the old man’s voiced over recollections and give the film its title. William loves his birds, providing them with the kind of attention that he never got from his violent father. Shot by artist Robert Alwyn Hughes (b. 1935) from Dowlais, Merthyr. His uncles bred pigeons and ponies.
Robert Alwyn Hughes attended Newport College of Art (1953-57), Leicester College of Art (1957-58) and the Royal College of Art (1958-61 – where he was a student of Ceri Richards’) and went on to teach at Cheltenham College of Art (1962-91) where, in the later years, he taught photography and film, working himself on TV commercials/commissioned films 1979-89. His paintings have been exhibited in Wales, England and America.
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