Evans Jill, Unit 3 CP Final Paper
Distant England - Jill Evans 2013 (cover)
Day 1. Walking and listening
Day 2. Voiding the distance
Day 3. Walking elsewhere
Day 4. A place
Conclusion
Bibliography
Introduction
In the following words I shall tell the story of walking in
Snowdonia over a four day stay in Capel Curig. I set off with clear intentions
to experience walking in this remote landscape with the possibility of a
diversion into somewhere unknown or a chance occurrence. As I move through this
terrain I will look, listen, notice, respond, connect and explore the impact of
walking, drawing and memory. I will examine how drawing might enquire and
communicate the little differences I find that could reveal a link to specific
place.
As I travel along this path I will be discussing my
reasoning and purpose in more detail through a gradual expansion into a wider
culture to return with knowledge of elsewhere.
Soren Kierkegaard goes for a wander at the optimum
pedestrian pace of three miles per hour he considers this to be the speed the
mind functions well at.
But unlike Kierkegaard being ‘so overwhelmed with ideas he
could scarcely walk’1
I hope to bring this story back to the individual reader.
I hope to bring this story back to the individual reader.
Day 1
Looking up towards the distant mountain ridge, the long
steep path rises northwards at right angles from Telford’s A5. We climb the
first style and walk until traffic sounds diminish before turning on the Zoom
microphone.
Swish, swish, swish of trouser sounds; amplified through the
headphones.
Initially I try an awkward, legs apart strut to quieten the
swish but eventually have to accept it as part of the whole experience and find
it interesting as it intensifies the rhythm of walking. My trouser legs are
creating a perfect auditory example of Marcel Duchamp’s ‘infra thin’. A moment
of discrete differences he defines in Notes;
Velvet trousers-/ their whistling sound (in walking)/ by/ brushing of the two legs is an/ infra thin separation signalled by/ sound. (It is not? An infra thin sound)2
Marcel Duchamp is discussing the interval that separates two
things as a moment of difference; an immeasurable gap that distinguishes one
from the other. I notice these moments of similarity and difference, they are
an element of observation and a tool for drawing.
Walking and listening through headphones, alters my
experience of the landscape that surrounds me. I have become absorbed in the
act of walking, each step building a changing rhythm, recording the physical
topography as I pass through it while at the same time listening intently:
wanting to find out how sound might explain distance.
Up towards lake - Phil Evans 2013
Pause - Drawing One
The far off ridge continuously disappears and reappears as
we walk towards it.
My focus shifts; switching from listening to seeing. Into
the mist the path continues to rise, the ridge is hidden and the structure of
hills and distance is hard to define, the steep incline becomes more physical,
more demanding. By focusing on the rhythm of walking I hadn't noticed how
quickly I gained height. The remote mountain ridge now dominates. I try to
respond with quick drawings of the ever changing mists that cover and uncover
the varied contours ahead. I recognise J.M.W. Turner’s problems and how he used
the advantages of a misty effect to accentuate distance in his work. Confusing
altering and denying form he developed his idea with and in the mist, giving it
a structure, he did not merely describe the spaces beneath.
Snowstorm JMW Turner 1842 - Jill Evans pencil on paper 2012
I add and remove the distance in front of me.
A glimmer of sun occasionally highlights the ridge, shining
through the mist, applying a religious glow. I recall our first walk here
sitting on the ridge above fearful of moving on in any direction. Go right, a
short climb up the sheer stepped cliff edge, go left, onto an initially awkward
but less terrifying rock climb, walking 8 miles further round in the cold and
wet. Or return back the way we came up; only now going down the almost
impossible scramble.
What was that? Suddenly ducking: an exceptionally deep
unnatural sound filled the sky and surrounding landscape. Looking up two ravens
are circling above our heads, their calls echoing unnaturally loudly around the
valleys beneath us.
Now it is quiet; sounds are distant; I walk to the edge of
the lake and draw ripples emerging from the mist.
My footsteps change, squelching across bog, clinking up
shale, slowing up slippery rocks, clothing rustling as wind increases, grey
drawings.
The landscape surrounds me, looking down I draw the lake.Mountain influences going deep into my mind.3
Hamish Fulton walks, it is his art; the encounter of
walking, ‘if I do not walk, I cannot make a work of art, ‘it’s about connection,
where rhythm of the walk meets the land’. 4 He speaks quietly on non-art issues with Haiku-like economy.
But how can a viewer access his work? A photograph does
little to explain Fulton’s direct contact ‘with’ or experience of a place, his
receptiveness to nature ‘blending mindbody with land’.5
David Reason,
quoted in Walking Journey writes that the ‘radical openness’ of ‘the
non-dominating experience of nature’, Fulton’s subject matter; ‘eludes
representation as such’.6
Rock, Fall, Echo, Dust Hamish Fulton - Walking Journey
Hamish Fulton chooses words for his graphic wall pieces,
words with minimal interference on the reflection of his walk, precise words
that allow the viewer a vast space for their own recollection.
Walk
The wind is stronger as the path narrows and roughens; loose
stones rattle downhill when disturbed and high above Lugwy ridge is silent.
I draw, looking back down into the distance across the A5. A
dull mist descends as I eat lunch, it’s pointless to continue, the ravens are
elsewhere.
The long walk back now faces Tryfan, loose shale is slippery
but progress quickens down the steep slope, I stop briefly to listen to the
skylarks in the mist above and draw the view towards Capel Curig.
It was raining so heavily last time I came down this slope,
I felt as if my legs were moving independently, going so rapidly I just sat
above and got carried back down to the traffic sounds by ‘a pair of patient
sublunary legs’.7
Sitting resting my legs I quietly think:
With clear head and strength returning aching muscles at peace with myself. The usual internal dialogue ceases. Thoughts come in slowly - slow enough to notice that they are irrelevant silly thoughts that evaporate with recognition. There is for a time a widening gap between one thought and the next… I am now acutely aware of all and everything around me and I make all the connections… but the heightened state remains a good memory, a reference point as to where I could and should be.8
Day 2
Walking up Moel Siabod the track changes frequently: tarmac,
gravel, grit, rock, stone and now slate; probably a waterfall in the winter.
Each surface has a unique sound with a rhythm that disrupts and disintegrates
over the difficult terrain.
The landscape is closer here, the path rises and changes
direction to negotiate steep rocky outcrops; it turns and opens into an
abandoned slate quarry. We stop next to the clear turquoise, deep cut pool,
below the slate cliffs, two walkers pass on their way back down, and ask ‘what
are you recording’? I explain and we discuss the history of the quarry; slate
as a commodity and walking. He says:
You should visit Parys Mountain, I grew up on Anglesey and visited it often as a child, the colours are amazing.
Continuing on up, my mind drifts to a recent Radio 3
broadcast on Psychogeography and into a discussion on how our sense of identity
is formed from knowledge and memory of places we encounter. Iain Sinclair
suggests with the glamour of travel now waning, search for adventure in your
own landscape, find unexpected and unknown vistas with a bit of Parisian
Situationist fun. Use a map of one place to find your way round another, enter
no entry signs or try to experience landscape in a different way.9
We hear a raven call close by, one is just appearing over the mountain above us, another joins it and they start to circle, are they attracted by the home made black fluffy cover of the Zoom mic I hold up high? Another arrives calling for its mate, the sound amplifies and their circling becomes more threatening. Number three is holding off waiting for its mate who suddenly appears from over the ridge behind us, just as number three comes in for the attack, I hear the rush of air through their huge wings, claws grab, feathers fly as they tumble and twist again and again directly in front of us. Amazing as it is I want them to stop. At last there is a victor and the pairs fly slowly off in opposite directions.
We hear a raven call close by, one is just appearing over the mountain above us, another joins it and they start to circle, are they attracted by the home made black fluffy cover of the Zoom mic I hold up high? Another arrives calling for its mate, the sound amplifies and their circling becomes more threatening. Number three is holding off waiting for its mate who suddenly appears from over the ridge behind us, just as number three comes in for the attack, I hear the rush of air through their huge wings, claws grab, feathers fly as they tumble and twist again and again directly in front of us. Amazing as it is I want them to stop. At last there is a victor and the pairs fly slowly off in opposite directions.
I breathe
And we realise, being so enthralled by the spectacle we
forgot to use the camera. A camera would have separated us from the actual
moment; the visceral, aural, visual experience is retained better as memory. A
photograph cannot accurately represent what is felt and seen, it will always be
a past moment in which ‘the photograph exerts its recording power and becomes
seen either as a view of path taken or as a view from the path’.10
J.M.W. Turner adjusts landscape to relate his experience of
walking there. He multiplies mountain ranges to heighten drama, alters scale,
blurs outline, removes trees, emptying the space to emphasise vastness and
evoke the real atmosphere of place, initially displaying poetry next to his
painting to stir the viewer’s emotions.11
Dolbadern Castle JMW Turner, 1800 - exhibited with poem at Royal Academy 2013
Observing the world, sunsets, science and progress he
notices visual effects, the after image of a train rushing past or how blurring
the horizon enlarges space. Understanding how we perceive he subtly applies
rules of interior perspective to explain distance in the landscape, ‘To enable
the spectator to see through the picture into space’.12
The Alps at Daybreak JMW Turner 1832/Turners Vignettes
Walking on, around and up Moel Siabod I look towards the
distant English landscape and begin to notice how the horizon line spreads and
grows as we climb, widening in space and depth, the curved layers multiply.
Drawings 11/12
I start removing marks to widen space in the drawing. I look,
examining the landscape for essential information and quickly discard all that
isn’t vital, the marks rapidly simplify as the distance expands. It is becoming
a process of emptying.
I found an interesting little book by J.R. Hillier in my
local charity shop; he co-incidentally lived close by, he collected and studied
Japanese drawings.
Skipping through to look at the sketchy landscapes I notice
there is rarely any suggestion of horizon, the minimal recording of
backgrounds, undefined spaces and mists cause a lack of fixity to the figures
and villages.
Vast space and absent horizons, mass, waves, wind and motion
are all simply suggestions of line or smudge. Hillier explains that emotion is
not overtly expressed in the drawing but ‘found in the eye of the beholder’.13 The natural elements confidently described in both concrete and abstract terms
are perceived and immediately interpreted by the viewer. I recognise Haiku14 rhythms within these images; five houses,
seven trees, three boats, essential poetic detail is emphasised; structure
links the elements in a rhythmic pulse and creates balance across the paper
surface.
Isle of the Blest Ogata Korin, ink
and colour on paper British Museum
Village at the Edge of The Sea
Suzuki Nanrei 1830, ink and colour on paper J.R. Hillier
Further on up, the gradual change of height continues to
adjust and alter the horizon, spreading layer upon layer of distant hills in an
almost continuous movement.
Kiefer recognises the importance of this observation as a
young man:
For this line is in reality no line, but rather movement, because there, where we see the line, the waves rule also, and the sea is as much in motion there as here. Alone the endless distance transforms the movement into line.15
An ambiguity of horizon alters and flattens the pictorial
space. W.H. Hudson comes across these conditions when a ‘soft bluish, silvery
haze’ cause ‘sea, sky and land to blend and infuse,’ 16 destabilising
thought and senses into an illusion of transition. Landscape in 18th century
Japanese drawing was not topographical, the brush strokes, ink and wash of
these odd scenes never become illustrative. Josiah Condor wrote in 1911
‘realistic treatment was considered destructive of the primary object of art
which was to adorn a surface without destroying the idea of a surface and
converting it into an illusion of space’.17
Landscape with Angler Tani Buncho ink on paper 1840 British
Museum
Eating lunch, we gaze out across the remote open landscape
that stretched across to England and watch a group of young men pick their way
across the bog in the distance.
I hear a loud thud, turning I see Phil lying silently, face
down, on a rock below. Panicking I scan around, nobody, no phone signal and too
far from anywhere to get help. He begins to move as I climb down the rocks.
He had slipped ‘arse over tip’ and landed nose first on a
boulder. I feel very alone; no one has passed by for some time now.
A significantly red nose, cut knee and broken Zoom mic,
otherwise good to go.
Walking now in damp socks; unable to find the pathway
through the bog, we start the ascent to the top of Moel Siabod. Is this the
right way? Another hour of walking, a short climb, we are no closer, a lot
further around and have a far longer walk back; no one has passed for several
hours since Phil’s fall.
The fear of being lost brings back other memories of being
lost, right back to childhood when it is a very real experience.
Wilderness: During the Wimbledon seminar on Witnessing the
Wilderness;18 the speakers agree, getting lost as a child
is an intense, physical and emotional event and the true experience of
wilderness:
The concept of wilderness is a construction anyway, as soon as someone is there witnessing it, it is no longer a wilderness.19
It can no longer exist if you are in it; you intrude and are
denied it experientially.
But being somewhere unknown, lost and alone brings the
wilderness closer.
It was about 3am walking back from the loo, flicks of white
disappearing in all directions are picked out in the torch light. I am camped
among the daisies (and Rabbits) just passed the warning sign that reads ‘You
are entering a remote area ...20
Walking briskly along the track and gazing up at the stars,
more stars than I have ever seen before. I scan around for the tent, there’s
nothing there, not one anywhere. I must have taken the wrong path, how long
have I been walking, I see no sign of anything remotely civilized, I stand
alone in my pj’s in the middle of the wilderness.
At Witnessing the Wilderness the discussion moves on to the
specifics of distant places each being accessed differently by the artists in
this exhibition. The hand-out reads:
The exhibition interrogates our preconceptions of the wilderness, and the role of the artist as adventurer, witness and mediator. 21
It is also a product of culture and a commodity; almost all
can be witnessed remotely, as Philip Rawson stated ‘a wild landscape sells
tweeds’.22
Artist James Ireland exhibits a cultivated wilderness in the
form of three instant waterfalls, the type you can find in any warehouse any
size that suits your needs. He surfs the internet for couples shared images of
romantic sunsets, presenting them on a digital picture frame entitled Mountain
Sunset 2013. His images elucidate perfectly how the idea of romance is
something constructed from a personal environment and their shared cultural
experiences.
Sunset Morte Hoe Devon – Phil Evans 2012
Interested in how your body reacts to place Deep Topographer
Nick Papadimitriou 23 walks for a purpose. He attempts to destabilise some of the more familiar areas
in the outskirts of London. Looking for an alternative description he links
memory and history to landscape. Ideas of a dark side; seldom noticed contours;
an object, drain, concrete post or granite kerbstone of unknown origin all
question what you know of a place and how you engage with it.
Getting lost quickly alters the experience of a place,
expanding it beyond anything than can be seen visually. There is always the
possibility of meeting dangerous people.
A derive: The exiled French philosopher Jean Jacques
Rousseau is out walking alone in amongst the deep wooded valleys on the
northern slopes of Leith Hill when he encounters Mr Malthus of the Rookery,
Westcott. Fearful of spies he flees in terror, believing that Mr Malthus, a
local curate, was an ‘emissary of the Government’.24
He was staying at Mr Spence’s cottage near the bottom of
Leith Hill, naming him in his diary:
July 23, 1759. To the "Hatch" to dinner, Mr. Evelyn, Mr. Godschal, Mr. Bridges, Mr. Steere, Mr. Spence, Mr. Courtenay and Mr. Walsh.25
I’m particularly attached to this story as I live and walk
in nearby Westcott; Rousseau later explains how perception is less than exact
in Emile, published in 1762:
Whenever one finds oneself in unknown places at night where we cannot judge of distance, and where we cannot recognise objects by their shape on account of the darkness, we are in constant danger of forming mistaken judgements as to the objects which present themselves to our notice’. He questions if this is why we see ‘spectres or gigantic and terrible forms’? A great tree at a distance could just be a bush close up or visa-versa.26
Then as soon as we perceive these forms they will suddenly
shrink and assume their real size:
but if we run away or are afraid to approach, we shall certainly form no other idea of the thing than the image formed in the eye.27
Rousseau considers that through walking, looking, feeling,
counting and measuring the dimension of things we learn to judge and understand
sight and distance, he takes with him a little paper book and a pencil:
These different objects offered me subjects of meditation for my walks; for, as I believed I had already observed, I am unable to reflect when I am not walking: the moment I stop, I think no more, and as soon as I am again in motion my head resumes its workings.28
Day 3
Instructions for a derive:
In a derive one or more persons during a certain period drops their relations, their work and leisure activities and all their other usual motives for movement and action, and lets themselves be drawn by the attractions of the terrain and the encounters they find there.29
In response to yesterday’s chance encounter we go in search
of Parys Mountain, on the way we stop at Penrhyn a 19th century fantasy Castle
built from profits of Welsh slate and Jamaican sugar. Its foreboding appearance
screams keep out and inside the horrors of ego and wealth cover its walls,
pillars, ceilings, collections and furniture. We have coffee and continue on to
Anglesey. Looking for Parys Mountain and without a map, we drive all the way
around the island until Bull Bay captures our attention.
Wind at Bull Bay - Jill Evans 2013
The north wind is so fierce here, it’s as if the whole world
is blowing directly into this tiny bay. (Checking the map later it really does,
funnelled straight down the Irish Sea.) Ironically its welsh name Porth
Llechog, means sheltered bay and is the most northerly village in Wales.
On top of Parys Mountain we cannot stand upright but decide
to take the trail through the copper mines anyway. The wind violently directs
our route around this moonscape of pink, orange, purple, ochre, and grey
embellished soils; colours caused by minerals such as copper, lead and sulphur:
Once one of the Sublime spectacles of late 18th and early 19th centuries industrial Wales, much visited by travellers and artists in search of the contemporary aesthetic notions of the Beautiful, the Picturesque or the Sublime.30
Parys Mountain - Jill Evans 2013
The walking artist or writer forms a deep connection to
landscape; this learnt aesthetic usually develops from early experiences of
their local environment.
A walking stick is an object that conveys a sense of the
future; it is the reason Joseph Beuys uses its image to link heaven, earth,
spirit and matter. Beuys explains his reasoning for the drawings in The Secret
Block for a Secret Person in Ireland to his friend and companion Caroline
Tisdall, who along with James Joyce is also partly the ‘secret person’.31
These drawings are his thinking process, they are his
questions and thoughts, an evolution of thinking forms developed through making
drawings that had no perfect formula to explain them. They exist as a question
and are ‘closer to reality’32
than a depiction of energy or element, they are his search for an alternative
language.
Energy Plan Joseph Beuys 1945 Collection Museum Schloss
He believes that man’s relationship to matter will always
endow it with significance; and he draws the significance giving it a visual
form that might include myth and knowledge with elements of water, mountain,
ice, crystal, heat, mineral and animal.
James Joyce gathers tiny fragments of experience that have a
greater importance, he labels them ‘epiphanies’ ‘those moments when, to the
artist’s ‘spiritual eye’, some entity, an object or situation, seems to become
irradiated by intense significance.’ It leaves behind its imprint.33
Joyce expands these
‘epiphanies’ into long detailed visual descriptions, examining each word while
paying attention to a deep flow of thought in his interior monologues. He
speaks a treasured phrase softly to himsel
A day of dappled seaborne clouds.34
He continues:
The phrase and the day and the scene harmonised in a chord.
The importance of that moment, its ‘associations of legend
and colour’, the visual, visceral experience is returned to him through the
perfect phrase that does more than purely describe but becomes a moment of
perfection itself.
Joyce recalls an insignificant moment and transforms the
experience of it for the reader, placing them elsewhere in their own reverie,
until gradually:
Consciousness of place came ebbing back to him slowly over a vast tract of time.35
National Gallery
I am searching for distance in the National Gallery and its
role in early landscapes. I find it supporting the figures until Filippino
Lippi in 1480 allows it a serious role by placing small figures within the
scene and lining up the main characters across the front in Adoration of the
Kings.
The Adoration of the Kings - Filippino lippi 1480 National
Gallery - Jill Evans pencil on paper 2013
Figures and landscape almost balance in The Conversion of St
Hubert from the Workshop of the Life of the Virgin, 1485 where a high horizon
enables the distant path to wind through remote wilderness and woodland into an
Arcadian hunting scene. In 1506 Giorgione relegates figures to a minor role,
lowering the horizon line until Landscape at Dusk expands into the distance.
Left: The Conversion of St Hubert Workshop of
the Life of the Virgin 1480 National Gallery -
Jill Evans pencil on paper 2013
Jill Evans pencil on paper 2013
Above: Landscape at Dusk Giorgioni 1506
National Gallery - Jill Evans pencil on paper 2013
I enjoy the quiet coolness in Room 20. Claude Lorraine
creates calm scenes of pastoral poetry, after the day’s work is finished and
activity is re-gathering or closing down. A late evening glow emerges in the
distance as if internally from the back of painting and shines towards the
viewer where soft rhythmic trees describe a gentle breeze. Simon Schama writes
in Landscape and Memory that the designed wilderness of Claude as reflected in
a Capability Brown landscape, is ‘unapologetic artificiality’36 with its purely pastoral ‘birdsong, wild honey and moonlight’.37
The wilderness is preserved in the sacred grove and stone
lions.
Mondrian the psychogeographer
Drawing as an observer Piet Mondrian was looking for a way
to let go or move beyond how the world appeared but needed to retain his way of
understanding what he saw around him. He rejected cubism’s ‘desiccated
abstraction’ implying it was a superficial arrangement of pattern and shape
devoid of vitality; he turned to abstract thinking, ‘Impressed by the vastness
of nature, I was trying to express its expansion, rest and unity’.38
Theosophy’s intuitive principle matched his personal
observations, ‘The immediate apprehension by the mind without reasoning, the
receiving of knowledge by direct perception’ but was Mondrian actually a
psychogeographer?
Mondrian relates to the whole experience of observing sea,
sky and stars when out walking, accessing more than the purely visual, he sees
his surroundings in a different way, as it exists through matter. Through
psychogeography he might have avoided Madame Blavatsky’s Spiritual
preoccupations.39
The intuitive form should emerge from nothing.40
Kazimir Malevich abandoned reference to outside world and
looked elsewhere into art itself to find a new Suprematism. To explain his
reasoning Malevich presented a strongly worded booklet - From Cubism and
Futurism to Suprematism: The New Realism in Painting along with his new work.
Insulting the dull and impotent artists, stuck in the
corners of nature he writes:
I have transformed myself in the zero of form and dragged myself out of the rubbish filled pool of Academic art.
I have destroyed the ring of the horizon and escaped from the circle of things, from the horizon-ring which confines the artist and the forms of nature.41
Observing how the Futurists are excited by new technology;
motivated by the whirring of propellers they paint the dynamics of movement. He
considered the fragmented and repeated objects violated the wholeness of
things. The Futurists related these fractioned images to subconscious intuition
but Malevich questions this intuition and believes it is actually a form of
‘utilitarian reason’ to be employed consciously and decisively by the artist.
His new abstract paintings are free from the necessity of
expressing whole objects and so scale becomes arbitrary, it is material mass
that remains important as he searches for truth not sincerity.
Day 4
Day 4
Where are you? The caller enquires, my answer locates us to
them, our being elsewhere contains no associations but where we are indicates
what we are doing and how free we are to speak; our situation.
Where am I? Asking myself this, internally questions my
focus.
John Berger explains this question is not about place but
‘what kind of world, what kind of set-up (agencement)’ we are in; it protects
our imagination from the accidental or hazardous surprise:
Any drawn place is both a here and an elsewhere. There is nothing else like these places; they are to be found only in drawings.42
A drawing made at the moment of being ‘here’ in this place,
contains information about itself and its own particularity ‘the moments of
choice have been kept visible’43
but also retain a sense of those rejected and lead elsewhere. The here in the
drawing is a place of necessity that contains the freedom of elsewhere.
Drawings 13-16
I am sitting on a large rock below Tryfan. My eyes follow
the route up along the A5 to Ogwen valley. I first indicate a few small
clusters of pine trees then focus on the sparse and dramatic mountains where
the road disappears.
I notice how each tiny remote cottage has a few pine trees
outside.
Later I sit inside The Ugly House drinking a cup of tea and
read the guide book, amongst the many tales of its origins author Rob Collister
explains its history:
Jean Jacques Rousseau initiated the Romantics movement’ he ‘inspired a taste for wild landscapes with gloomy chasms, sounding cataracts and lofty precipices.44
Ty Hyll or The Ugly House was built as a picturesque touch
to enhance the wilderness on Telford’s new London to Holyhead road, now the A5.
Rousseau's pupil and the designer of Ermenonville garden, M
Giridin speaks of the peaceful life at Ermenonville:
Jean-Jacques used to rise, ‘he tells us,’ with the sun, and spend the whole day in roving through the woods and meadows in search of herbs. In the evenings he would take a row with his friends on the lake, himself plying an oar, so that the children used to call him their 'Sweet-water Admiral'. Sometimes the party would sit in some shady spot by the riverside listening to the strains of the clarionette.45
We follow the sign down a narrow winding road, driving
endlessly along a remote wooded valley and stop in the middle of nowhere.
Drawing 17, the last page
Half way down, the steps disappear off into the distance,
the sides are steeply wooded, motivated by the way the path drops suddenly
ahead, I draw quickly.
Stepping inside the guide greets us enthusiastically,
‘Welcome to Ty Mawr’.
A remote cottage that once stood on the main drovers’ road, three
pine trees were planted outside as a symbol of welcome rest and a meal for the
drovers.
Ty Mawr, Morgan’s Cottage - Phil Evans 2013
This very day; 24.5.2013 the owners, (National Trust) had
successfully made a bid for one of the last remaining original welsh bibles
translated by William Morgan. William Morgan, born here in 1545 was a
‘linguistic treasure’ responsible for establishing the correct usage of
standardised Welsh.
Back home I read:
The journeys told here take their bearings from the distant past but also from the debris and phenomena of the present for this is often a double insistence of old landscapes: ‘they can be read in the then but felt in the now’.46
Today’s expanding cultural connections expose and confuse
ways of viewing and understanding reality with its multiplying beliefs;
creating contradictions that now allow a commonality of ‘undecideability’.47
Anselm Kiefer’s paintings reflect on the left over debris
from past and present. Matthew Biro explains how his ‘undecidable’ works of
art’48
allow ‘contradictory readings about morally charged subjects’. A viewer is
faced with many conflicting interpretations where meaning remains open or
undefinable and its ‘undecideability’ is potentially shared by many.
Spiritual Heroes Anselm Kiefer. oil and charcoal on burlap
1973
In Germany’s Spiritual Heroes-1973, Kiefer intentionally
directs the viewer towards the centre with a single-point perspective but each
individual now questions their own position, to observe this huge empty wooden
space as might the easel painter, identifying themselves inside the illusion or
to remain outside as observer:49
Identification and illusionism are constantly produced, broken down, and reconstituted – a process that both generates ambiguity and promotes a self-reflexive phenomenological attitude in the mind of the viewer.50Where am I?
I am sitting on a park bench in Ealing and switch
on Janet Cardiff’s narrative. Instantly I am connected to her reality, she
is sitting on a park bench in Central Park, New York describing children on bikes
passing by. Children cycle past at exactly the same moment here in London. I
listen, she continues the descriptions but my mind wanders as a cat has just
approached and a small group gather round to stroke it. A choir is practising:
she explains ‘I am very bad at linear working; I use an open ended narrative,
skipping from one thing to another’. I listen, as she passes through the
streets of New York and begins to distinguish memory from perception. ‘In pure
memory the temporal sequence of events is shattered’. I agree but start to lose
interest and realise that listening to the narrative is displacing me from
being here, now. Police sirens pass in the distance, was it here, or there in
Central Park?
Janet Cardiff would like to ‘move a whole room like a time
machine from London to New York’. I think she just moved a park.51
I Look at Bruce Nauman’s drawing and read the title Six
Inches of My Knee Extended to Six Feet; ah, the moment of movement instantly
registers but it is my own knee I see retreating before me, taking me to
another place.52
Bruce Nauman Six Inches of My Knee Extended to Six Feet.
Pencil and tape on paper 1967
Nauman questions how art generally adds information to a
situation and if by removing information causing sensory dislocation can it
also be art? He relates basic materials such as sound, light and movement to
the site of the work where a viewer provides the sensory poetry, involuntarily
bringing in their own personal experiences.
Phil enters room, his knees hurt, he is fixing the bathroom
floorboards.
I was lost inside Mike Nelson’s ‘The Coral Reef’ at Tate
Britain.53 Searching
for the way back I find more rooms I don’t recognise there are no signs that
might help my disorientation. It’s so quiet now, where has everyone gone? I wish
I was with someone in here... I wonder what would happen if I had a panic
attack... have I ever had a real one... how would I react if... with this
thought I start to feel very scared. I have no idea how I would react if I lost
control.
The fear of being lost in there transformed my experience of
an art exhibition but it is at that moment of being lost that the artwork
becomes complete.
That moment of being lost is the work, as in process art, it
is the time of process and not the residue of activity that is the art.
The process and temporality of drawing is analysed in
Afterimage, Cornelia Butler explains how an unfinished drawing contains
ambiguity of time, both the time exposed through its making, its duration and
measure of pastness and its possibility of futurity. It is the process of
making that both dictates and informs the drawing but its reality is elsewhere
in the mind of the observer, the here now of the drawing and its making is an
observed image that leads a viewer elsewhere.
By its nature drawing is a process of abstraction, the line
or mark is an invention, distanced from what it represents, it contains both
form and matter but this difference is almost indistinguishable.
Unmonumental sculpture appears as if from nowhere, objects
propped, unfolded or slumped without status are ready to be quickly disassemble
and moved on. Their instability is awkward do they dissolve into the world of
nomad or fortify their own borders?
Anna Barriball Untitled II 2008 ink on paper
Silently lurking in the corner Anna Barriball’s Untitled II 54
is no longer a drawing, the density, crease and crumple move it beyond its
making as it occupies and influences a viewer’s response each different in
their perception.
Conclusion
We have journeyed together through mist and wind, and
variations of a place. Walked across remote areas and into the distance,
touched on wilderness and encountered hazards, inadvertently absorbing a
multitude of experiences.
Our engagement connects drifts and alters with our focus,
continuously evolving through the global complexity of experiences we
encounter. I am in agreement with Walter Benjamin, ‘everything is connected but
there is no single vantage point’.55
The landscape informs our growth and we know who we are by
the ‘topographies of self we carry within us’.56 Drawing is the
evidence of these connections; their transitory marks relate to a viewer’s own
instinct and reasoning and takes them to a place elsewhere.
But the drawing also contains its own authority and returns
a viewer to the moment of the drawing; to this place here, where it is now.
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visited 10.7.2013
James
Ireland, Ian Brown, Geirant Evans, Simon, Dan Heyes (2013) Witnessing the
Wilderness Seminar, Wimbledon Space
Up towards
lake - Phil Evans 2013
Snowstorm/JMW
Turner 1842 - Jill Evans pencil on paper 2012Dolbadern Castle JMW Turner, 1800
exhibited with poem at Royal Academy 2013
Rock, Fall,
Echo, Dust Hamish Fulton - Walking Journey p.72
Parys Mountain
- Jill Evans 2013
Village at
the Edge of The Sea Suzuki Nanrei 1830, ink and colour on paper/J.R. Hillier
Drawings of the Masters, Japanese Drawings from the 17th through the 19th
Century.
Isle of the
Blest Ogata Korin, ink and colour on paper British Museum/ Drawings of the
Masters, Japanese Drawings from the 17th through the 19th Century
Landscape
with Angler Tani Buncho, ink on paper 1840 British Museum/ Drawings of the
Masters, Japanese Drawings from the 17th through the19thCentury.
The Alps at
Daybreak JMW Turner 1832, Turners Vignettes p.75
Wind at
Bull Bay - Jill Evans 2013
The
Adoration of the Kings Filippino Loippi 1480 National Gallery - Jill Evans
pencil on paper 2013
The
Conversion of St Hubert Workshop of the Life of the Virgin 1480 National
Gallery - Jill Evans pencil on paper 2013
Landscape
at Dusk Giorgioni 1506 National Gallery - Jill Evans pencil on paper 2013
Ty Mawr,
Morgan’s Cottage - Phil Evans 2013
Spiritual
Heroes Anselm Kiefer. oil and charcoal on burlap 1973 Anselm Kiefer and the
Philosophy of Martin Heidegger p.34
Bruce
Nauman Six Inches of My Knee Extended to Six Feet. Pencil and tape on paper 1967
Afterimage p.83
Anna
Barriball Untitled II 2008 ink on paper Drawing Sculpture p.4
Energy Plan
Joseph Beuys 1945 Collection Museum Schloss Mayland © Joseph Beuys Estate/VG
Bild-Kunst, found on artcatalyse.net
Claude
Lorraine - National Gallery. 2013
Constable
Gainsborough Turner and the Making of Landscape. RA 2012
Drawing
Sculpture. Drawing Room. Bermondsey,
London: 14 Feb – 6 April. 2013
Duchamp -
The Bride and the Bachelors. Duchamp with Cage, Cunningham, Rauschenberg and
Johns. Barbican 2013
Ellen
Gallagher. AxME. Tate Modern 2013
Goya prints
at British Museum 2012
Light Show
– Hayward Gallery. London. 2013
Mall Galleries,
Memory & Imagination, Dutch Italianate and Contemporary Landscapes. London:
Mall Galleries 2013.
Mike Nelson
- The Coral Reef. Tate Britain
Mondrian
and Nicholson in Parallel. Christopher green, Barnaby Wright, The Courtauld
Gallery.Exhibition 16 Feb-20th May 2012. London.
Mondrian
and Nicholson in Parallel. The Courtauld Gallery. 16 Feb-20 - May 2012. London
National
Gallery - Looking for distance. 2013
Schwitters
in Britain. Tate Britain. 2013
Simon
Starling – Phantom Ride. Tate Britain, 2013 May
The Genius
of J.W. Turner. Watched 29.4.13 BBC Revolution - Industry/technology
Walk On: 40
Years of Art Walking. Pitzhanger Manor Gallery. Ealing 27 March – 5 May 2013
We meet
walking artist Simon Pope, we cross the park and chat without really noticing
any scenery. He escorted us out of the park as his contribution in 'Walk On'.
We re-enter and admire the blossom and trees on the way back, then sit at the
kiosk, eat ice cream and people watch.
Witnessing
the Wilderness. Wimbledon Space. 2013
Infrathin
in notes, (green box 1934?) subtle, sensorial experiences
Immeasurable
gap between two things as they transition each other
Magnifying
glass for touching infrathin.
The warmth
of a seat (that had just been vacated) is infrathin.
When the
fumes of tobacco also smell of the mouth that exhales it, the two odors
co-mingle by way of infrathin.
2 forms
cast in the same mold (?) differ from each other by infra thin separable
amount.
The
condensation or moisture on polished surfaces (glass, copper) is infrathin.
(Duchamp
1980 (n. 32r, 4, 11v, 35, 36) pp. 21-36)
Note 12-My
interpretation of distance in Pigott, Jan. (1993) Turner’s Vignettes. London.
Tate Gallery
Looking
through the images I notice Turner achieves distance by applying perspective
rules as if drawing the inside of a room. Clever manipulation of hills, trees,
rock etc draws the viewers eye into the distance, the viewpoint in an interior
does not collide on a horizon but often somewhere vague. I propose that Turner
uses this to his advantage and does not interrupt distance with an horizon
line. But this is another essay.
Note 14-The
rules of Haiku.
Lowenstein,
Tom, editor, (2007). Classic Haiku The
rules of Haiku. London: Duncan Baird Publishers p.15 Haiku consists of 17
syllables, made up of 3 phrases of five, seven and five syllables within this
format, the Haiku was divided also into two parts standing in contrast or
reversal to each other.
Note 15-An
excerpt from Kiefer’s diary 18 years old writing on how captivated he is with
the horizon on a visit to the seashore.
‘This
absolutely straight unending line, which makes no concessions, and which runs
as far as the sea runs. Everything orients itself according to this line, we
determine the elevation of the land. It is objectively always the same. What
would it be like travelling on a boat on the ocean and seeing this line all
around one wherever one looks? It is therefore also nothingness. But not the
nothingness of Heidegger, which he particularly crosses out, but rather the
existing nothingness. For this line is in reality no line, but rather movement,
because there, where we see the line, the waves rule also, and the sea is as
much in motion there as here. Alone the endless distance transforms the
movement into line’. p.7
Biro,
Mathew. (1998) Anselm Kiefer and the Philosophy of Martin Heidegger. United
Kingdom: Cambridge University Press
Note 39-Art Movements -
TheosophyIn 1908 Mondrian began to study the theosophical movement, guided by Helena Petrovna Blavatsky. Mondrian's interest in spirituality remained an important factor throughout his life and career
Theosophy and De Stijl http://www.the-art-world.com/history/de-stijl4.htm#.Ucn60_nVC80 25.6.13
Mondrian was a member of the Dutch Theosophical Society from 1909 and kept a picture of Madame Blavatsky in his studio. Nelly van Doesburg has confirmed that was so even as late as 1921.
Mondrian referred to theosophy as "another expression of the same spiritual movement
which we represent at present in painting".
Note 53-Nelson,
Mike, ‘The Coral Reef’ exhibition at Tate Britain London November 2011 http://jillevansstudio.blogspot.co.uk/
On entering
the Tate Gallery I notice a large section that looks as if it is closed for
re-hanging, I try to find the entrance to Mike Nelson’s Coral Reef and look for
the usual white space. A gallery attendant points to the scruffy and
insignificant door. There are no signs, no indication of what might be
inside.It looks like an abandoned Taxi cab office. Through the next door, another neglected space and down this grubby corridor more rooms with signs of a shady past, or waiting areas for something unpleasant. I tread carefully in the dim lighting, past old worn couches, random light fittings, and assorted objects left behind after a quick exit. These objects are familiar, reference past fears and are disturbing. There is a variety of office seating and a used mattress possibly taken from a skip? I had a couch just like that in a bedsit but had to cover it in flea powder before sitting on it. Everything has had a previous use and the feeling of hopelessness builds. I carry on past grimy carpets and temporary floor surfaces, these abandoned spaces continue to imply unease, what lies beneath the layers of old newspaper on the floor? More doors; do I want to continue on or return?
This is hard work, most exhibitions usually have a preferred route, mapping the way through from beginning to end. You know how to navigate it even if you prefer to make your own way around. At least you can be sure not to miss the good bits.
Ah I think I've been here before but now choose another door. I pass one or two people and can hear footsteps elsewhere and distant door hinges squeaking, so many small, hostile rooms seem to interconnect endlessly.
Which way next errm...
Ah here’s an attendant or is he a security guard, is he part of this … I ask, he is not.
Round a corner and through more small unpleasant spaces, (It’s quite creative how many ways you can make a room look sordid) I have seen these places before in films, bad dreams and reality, only this time it is the artist controlling my time in here. Have I been in this room before...
It’s quiet no other sounds, footsteps or squeaking doors ... it’s very quiet... it would be funny if I couldn't find the way out... I feel uncomfortable... why haven’t I bothered to notice the direction I came in... How did I get to this bit... I acknowledge a slight unease... where was that security bloke?
Searching for the way back I find more rooms I don’t recognise and there are no signs that might help my disorientation. It’s so quiet now, where has everyone gone? I wish I was with someone in here... I wonder what would happen if I had a panic attack... err, don't know if I ever actually had a real one... don’t know how I would react if... and now with this thought I do start to feel very scared. I don't know how I would be if I lost control?
"We do not have to be long in the woods to experience the always rather anxious impression of going deeper and deeper’ into a limitless world. Soon, if we do not know where we are going, we no longer know where we are". Gaston Bachelard – The Poetics of space
Is there a door handle that might be an exit, are the fire exit signs real, if I follow them where will I end up? Every thought makes things worse, my heart is pounding and my stomach churns as the real fear of losing control gets closer, try this door, another room, another room, another room...
Here is the reception and the security bloke, I try to calmly ask “ How do I get out?”
“Straight ahead and through the door.”
This corridor is not straight and the door opens into a sort of bin storage area, do I go through the fire exit over there and possibly into a back street. It doesn't look right. I have to go back but at least I remember how I got here this time. “Yes trust me” he says encouragingly. So back into the bin room I spot a bright sliver of light under the door.
Now out in
the familiar Tate corridor I remember my intention was to make a drawing in
there, so feeling brave now, I almost liked the idea of being lost inside. I
step back in and note each door as I walk through but after the fourth door I
have had enough fear returns and I quickly retrace my steps. The attendant
outside looked indifferent as I re-emerged so quickly.
I realise how easily I had ignored the fire exit signs when looking for a way out, probably because they are accepted information and never an actual part of the art?
The fear of being lost in there completely transformed my experience of an art exhibition and memories of Tate Britain. Now back to the shop!
Connections
cut from essayI realise how easily I had ignored the fire exit signs when looking for a way out, probably because they are accepted information and never an actual part of the art?
The fear of being lost in there completely transformed my experience of an art exhibition and memories of Tate Britain. Now back to the shop!
Nick Franglen
Musician producer artist explains:
Hive is an
investigation into and comment on how we deal with the increasing torrent of
information with which we are confronted, and the choices we make in filtering
that information.The immersive surround-sound experiences at Latitude hums with around 60 radios, each one is tuned to a different channel. The cacophony of sounds changes throughout the day as you listen, individual fragments might break out or you focus in more clearly to speech during the news, before the sound mix expands back out again. Almost becoming a demonstration of how the brain filters, locates and connects to the multiple sensations around?
Franglen,
Nick. July 2013 'Hive' Latitude festival. England: The Wellcome Trust
Fiona Rae
In the spring
copy of Cultural Quarterly Fiona Rae talks about how she embraces the eclectic
mix of visual imagery available with today’s immediate access to film clips,
symbols and photos from across the globe. She draws on traditional and
multi-cultural influences, combined with disassembled parts maybe from a
science fiction movie or disintegrating cartoon panda. The paintings include
evidence of their history and yet Rae ‘responds to and participates in the
culture of our times’. Acknowledging these influences she talks about ‘I Need
Gentle Conversations’ oil and acrylic on canvas, 2012:
It seems
rather ethereal and a bit like a Chinese landscape painting, with veils of
dripping paint and a few wispy brush drawings.
Her
paintings maintain their abstract discipline while ambiguity allows them to
remain open to interpretation.Rae, Fiona.(In Spring 2013) Cultural Quarterly P.6
1 Kierkegaard in Macfarlane, Robert. (2012) The Old Ways, A Journey on Foot. London: Penguin p.27
2 Duchamp Marcel. (1983) Notes. (green box 1934)Arranged and translated by Paul Matisse, G.K. Hall: Boston
3 Watkins, Jonathan and Martin, Sarah, (Editors) (2012). Hamish Fulton, Walking in Relation to Everything. Birmingham: Ikon Gallery and Turner Contemporary p.5
5 Tufnell p.27
6 Tufnell p.27
7 Macfarlane, Robert. (2012) The Old Ways, A Journey on Foot. London: Penguin p.25
Quote also in http://www.john-keats.com/briefe/110719.htm 7.7.2013
Quote also in http://www.john-keats.com/briefe/110719.htm 7.7.2013
8 Scott, Doug cited in Tufnell (2002) Hamish Fulton walking journey p.34
10 Tufnell p.27
11 Thornbury, Walter. (1970) The life and Correspondence of JMW Turner. London: Ward Lock Reprints p.539/40
12 Pigott, Jan. (1993) Turner’s Vignettes. London. Tate Gallery p.27
13 Hillier, J.R. (1965) Drawings of the Masters, Japanese Drawings from the 17th through the 19th Century. New York: Shorewood Publishers Inc p.21
14 Lowenstein, Tom. editor (2007) Classic Haiku. The rules of Haiku. London: Duncan Baird Publishers p.15
15 Biro, Mathew. (1998) Anselm Kiefer and the Philosophy of Martin Heidegger. United Kingdom: Cambridge University Press p.7
16 Hudson W. H. Afoot in England cited in Macfarlane, Robert. (2012) The Old Ways, A Journey on Foot. p.77
17 Hillier p.16
18 ‘Witnessing the Wilderness’ Exhibition at Wimbledon Space. (2013)
19 Dan Hays speaking at Witnessing the Wilderness seminar
20 Remote area warning sign on Skye – You are entering remote, sparsely populated potentially dangerous mountain country. Please ensure that you are adequately experienced and equipped to complete your journey without assistance. Camping at Glen Brittle on the Isle of Skye
21 Witnessing the Wilderness handout
22 Rawson, Philip. (1969) Drawing the Appreciation of the Arts. London: Oxford University Press p.8
23 Radio 3 Walking with Attitude. Viewed 7.7.2013
26 Rousseau p.82 Rousseau, Jean-Jacques, (1762)The Project Gutenberg eBook of Emile http://intersci.ss.uci.edu/wiki/eBooks/BOOKS/Rousseau/Emile%20Rousseau.pdf viewed 7.7.2013
27 Rousseau p.82
28 Rousseau Confessions 9 http://books.google.co.uk/books?id=rSw6c9q5KUcC&pg=PT450&lpg=PT450&dq
30 http://www.ccgc.gov.uk/landscape--wildlife/protecting-our-landscape/historic-landscapes/amlwch-and-parys-mountain.aspx viewed 17.7.2013
32 Koepplin, Dietier. (1988) Joseph Beuys. The Secret Block for a Secret Person in Ireland. Schirmer Mosel p.48
33 Joyce, James 1992) edition (Portrait of the Artist as a young Man. Hertfordshire: Wordsworth Editions P.vii
34 Joyce p.128
35 Joyce p.108
36 Sharma, Simon. (1995) Landscape and memory. Landscape as a work of the mind. New York: Vintage Books. p.540
37 Schama p.531
38 Milner, John. (1992) Mondrian. New York: Phaidon Press Ltd p.125
39 http://www.the-art-world.com/history/de-stijl4.htm#.Ucn60_nVC80 viewed 25.6.13 Theosophical Society member 1909
40 Malevich, Kazimir, Booklet http://www.mariabuszek.com/kcai/ConstrBau/Readings/MlevchSupr.pdf viewed 12.02.2013
41 Malevich booklet maria buszek
42 Berger p.143
43 Berger p.143
44 Collister, Rob. (2005) Ty Hyll, The Ugly House, guidebook. Wales: Snowdonia Society p.5
45 Hill, Constance. (1904) Juniper Hall: A Rendevous of Certain Illustrious Personages during the French Revolution Including Alexandre D'Arblay and Fanny Burney. London & New York: John Lane, The Bodley Head, 1904. Viewed 7.7.2013 http://digital.library.upenn.edu/women/hill/burney/junip.html
46 Macfarlane p.33
47 Biro Mathew. (1998) Anselm Kiefer and the Philosophy of Martin Heidegger. United Kingdom: Cambridge University Press. p.4
48 Biro, p.5
49 Anselm Kiefer. Spiritual Heroes-1973 in Biro p.34
50 Biro p.37
51 Cardiff, Janet and Miller, Georges Bures (2005) The Walk Book and CD. At Walk On: 40 Years of Art Walking. Pitzhanger Manor Gallery. Ealing
52 Bruce Nauman Six Inches of My Knee Extended to Six Feet. Butler, Cornelia H. (1999) Afterimage: drawing through process The Mitt Press: Massachusetts p.83
53 Nelson, Mike, Coral Reef - Installation at Tate Britain,
54 Anna Barriball Untitled II 2008- ink on paper - Lovatt, Anna. (2012) Drawing Sculpture. London: Drawing Room p.4
55 Withers, Rachel. A Storyteller’s Map: Six Signposts (after Benjamin) found on Melanie Jackson http://www.melaniejackson.net/publications/essays-press/a-storytellers-map-six-signposts-after-benjamin-by-rachel-withers/
56 Macfarlane, Robert. (2012) The Old Ways, A Journey on Foot. London: Penguin P.26
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