18 & 19 July 2017

Re-Thinking, Re-Imagining and Re-Narrativising Site Working with a single site and the idea of close­‐up and fragmentation, rather than seeking to address a coherent whole, we wish to identify and find points of engagement between the self and place: detail of land, nature and modern habitation. We work with a nondescript site, unburdened by any obvious cultural and historical links. For this project we use walking and visitation, narration and conversation, observation and a sense of seeing as initial devices to explore, record and find inventive ways for responding to a specific site though our own creative and poetic practice. Inventiveness in this instance does not refer to something pre-­prescribed but a reflexive way of working that refers back to individual connections with the site that may offer fresh perspectives. It is something that emerges in time and over time by being attentive to the specificity of site so that each narrative outcome functions as a starting point, with each narrator offering her/his story (from being attentive to the site) as she/he explores aspects of their connection to the site. So, that each narrative emerges out of encounters with modalities and agencies that affectively shape each narrator’s own relationship to the site. The term inventiveness is key in this instance in defining a practice that is relational in the sense of an integrated self that is connected and affected by human and non-human things and objects. The project is also collaborative in that it is developed both on the basis of a reflexive way of working that refers back to individual connections with the site but where the outcomes provide a common complex weave of responses to a particular location. The project will be constituted by initial workshops in observation and meditational ways of seeing with the whole body that will lead to a final collaborative outcome that is textual, spoken and has the element of performance. The intention is to demonstrate a way of engaging with one’s immediate environment by resisting any attempts to report from a removed point of view of specialized learning and a position of knowing, or a certainty of belonging, but rather work from a space where knowing grows through affective points of impact that incite each contributor’s curiosity.

Workshop program breakdown: 

• Introduction and search for site (2hrs approx.)
• Workshop in observation and meditational workshop (3hrs approx. need not be done on the same day)
• Walking the site together / discussion (3-­4 hrs.)
• Each participant works on their own and in their own time over several days and in between other activities
• Collating material / editing and discussion about presentation (possibly a full day)
• Presentation / performance

The project’s main elements are: 

Walking as a meditative device for looking and locating / the use of writing, drawing, collecting, photographing as ways of leading to narration / there will be workshops. 

The outcome is to be in the form of spoken word – performance, possibly but not necessary accompanied by still photograph or video projection. To complement the workshop I will give a short non-academic talk, which is illustrated by visual examples from students work. I would also like to invite other educationalist, who are interested in walking as a form of pedagogy, to a round table discussion.