“The shoes That Were Danced to Pieces” for ‘Dance’, the very last day of Folktale week 2020 on Instagram!
For this final story prompt, I visited my trusty old Grimms Fairy Tale book, and was inspired by this tale, otherwise known as “The Twelve Dancing Princesses”
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Each night, 12 princesses wear their shoes out with dancing, even though they are locked in their room. The king seeks someone to find what his daughters are doing each night. A wounded soldier accepts the challenge and discovers the secret passageway the girls follow to meet their suitors to dance the night away. As a reward for his work, the soldier is given the oldest princess as his wife and is promised he will be king after the current king passes away.
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A sad tale, as I believe the shoe covers the foot and so represents their stance, or viewpoint. The 12 do escape the king’s power by dancing night after night, thereby wearing out their shoes, but are sadly overpowered in the end...
Keeping it simple this time, I’ve thrown and decorated a wonky, “folky” porcelain pot and shown the worn out dancing shoes, to me the focal, poignant point in the story.
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I hope you’ve enjoyed some of my illustration play over Folktale week - I’ve loved being involved! Thanks organisers at @folktaleweek and @storycamp_disco 🙏😀