Urban re:passages

October 2009;

1000 lost walks.

A step to a sociological future.

I have just enrolled as a member of CUCR also practicing for Research Architecture.

This is funded by AHRC.

This is now my life. In all senses. Research and practice form my staple diet for the consumption of the knowledge of the everyday.

A review of my stance; a perspective of the mountains which I am over looking as I stand.

First to review:

Performance Work: 1000 lost Walks.

This is a developmental body of experimental research collated from a series of reflections from a series of on going walks and journeys I have made in the past six months; from England; to France; to Venice; to home; to happiness; to sadness; alone; together. I have journeyed from city to sea; to forest; from retreat; to mass; to solitude. A walk to remember; a walk to forget; a walk to forgive; a walk to generate; a walk to emerge; a walk to pause; a walk to begin; a walk to question; a walk to fight; a walk to escape; a walk to love; a walk to memory. Each walk has been documented in a photographic journal; photographs allowing me to take possession of the spaces I have passed; an act of non intervention to capture practice; my walks have become a systematic realization for image gathering to form sociological impressions and personal cartographies of landscapes. I have further developed a movement vocabulary from the series of impressions and imprint each journey created and left on me; this now forms a physical notation of the journeys I made in a non linear dialogue between actuality; memory and impression.

I aim to take a thousand walks. What forms as an imprint take a form of muddled cacophony of voices; forged fragments; as the distance increases; the rhythmic patterning of a walk that forms a series of imprints that in time forms a nostalgia for nothing and everything. A walk to frame the mind. A series of lands that create some narrative form to swift moving thought. A path that leads to somewhere where an image forges memory and relationship with body time and space and allows narrative to form through non linear dialogue.  A walk through a place that does not have a name; and does not have an identity past the notions I cement in my mind; to become a place; to become an identity that shakes the root of all clause to definite geography. I walk the day through.  A smell of the familiar and a thought of certainty. So many sights which I cannot list of such timeless beauty that makes me always a little  sorrowful. So many thoughts that consume as the city becomes once again familiar; this is the city that carries my mind. What is to photograph? To collect and store images of  my journeys.  The essence of place still held yet fades slightly with the paper in time. To sit in a heap of images as to what a city could be and wonder what the city may become when we leave it be. Realizing that I have constructed my maps of the city entirely through memory, finding my way through this labyrinth through the reminiscence of where my feet have trodden before. The rain that falls in sheets and leaves us dejected and sodden. The streets can glisten but the bird chooses not to look, seeking sanctuary instead in Sun Valley Amusements.What labyrinth shall we take today? What scenes shall we imagine as we sit here and watch?  The city takes the shape that it will take Our eyes witness the city take the shape we wish it to take. Create desires to impress upon urban form and create with gladness. A new maze to traverse. This is the city of dreams. The desires of dystopia and creation of new urban form. Our language is in images and we hoard postcards as souvenirs. This the language of reason and photos fall as confetti in this marriage of eye and foot. Do not cross the line we are told again and again. I am finding a new heart of this urban maze. It beats slow and diseased and yet still retains beauty .The city performs. The city is a bright new show. Cheap ring side seats.

Results of research:

15 Minute Factory at Rag Factory

http://15minutefactory.blogspot.com/2009/08/performance-installation-thousand-lost.html

Research for a visual sociological future ( ? )

Score for visual performance.

The following series of actions can be taken in any order and for any duration, this should be decided before the action occurs. Before the desired action is taken; the mind must have clarity; a form of openness to the fluxus that exists in consciousness and a series of actions can be taken that allow and accommodate any mental state. To exist to with a blank mind is not possible and should not be struggled for as such a demand create stress and uncertainty in the body and mind.

Walk.

+++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++

A slow walk that allows the body to become accustomed to space. The sensation of air touching every surface of the body. A motion of weight and certainty as to wear it falls and rises, the sensation of texture of the surface of which the foot encroaches. A determination in stride; a focus both internal and external that allows rhythm to be noted and forgotten, the memory of the last step does not consume.

Stillness.

A figure alone in the mists of dawn which stands alone and awaits the sun to activate shadowy climbs.  A pause and an activation of great momentum of perspective. A clarity of intention. Stillness is simply without large activation of gestural form. An internal state of flux which can only be felt in the beating a the heart, a notation of the heart beat that rises and climbs faster; breath that expands every space in the body; filling every crevasse with life and energy.

Pause

– – – – – – – – – – – – – – – –  – – – – – – –          — – – – – – – – — – – – – – – – – – _ — – – – – – -__

Suspension of all activity; pause from life; momentary death; deprivation of all life and sensation as a search for a non existent void which cannot exist within life force. A pulse which gathers force and will not allow such sensation to exist. Admit defeat from such quest and allow action.

Breathe

To allow breath to fill each crevasse that is vacant. The lungs expand; bigger and bigger; a growing seething mass; then a decision is made to vacate; the air is quickly dislodged; pushed out; rejected. The body can feel anything; cleansed; empty; nothing; something; who can decide. To decide to breathe in; to decide to exhale; the movement of the body; the solitude of such decision.

Dive

To dive into space; hurling; hurtling; heathing; a space vacant; waiting to be filled; consumed.

Calling

Calling for a space to allow us to enter; calling for a space to allow it be become empty; to allow it to become full again of a weight. Calling to an abstract through the body; calling sorrow or remorse through aching limbs and heavy heart.

Sit

Interrupt

To not allow the force of continuum to consume; to instead allow so

Fall

To run and to collapse. To try to rise. To seep into a mound; to be aware that the weight of the earth will effortlessly seep you in. To allow. To fight and struggle to saunter and allow the unexpected; as this will be the total sum of the fight. To fall, to fight; to struggle; to purposefully seek the discontent of the allowance of the upright.

Run

Yawn

Roll

Enter

Empty

Potential workshops:

A workshop in mind: body: time and space

This is a workshop / open forum session which I have developed as a two day collaborative exchange project in order to both ask and answer question about creative working methodology and in order to create a forum situation for artists/ architects/ dancers/ designers/ thinkers/ planners/ painters/ and al. to develop a series of collaborative works which will allow both a production and a series of thought provoking dialogues and open conversations. The themes of the exercise are a series of questions as to the chosen direction of focus. This will mimic an ‘Open Space’ Event and allow the individuals involved to develop a theme which is most relevant to them from the outset of the process. The notion of creating work in the public realm for the public; an exploration of the notion of performance of the everyday; without performance; public art with no boundary for entry of exit. To edit to remove? To include to allow a further inclusion of potential.