Technological Intimacy

I've always liked Bjork, in the way that I love all women who push boundaries and refuse to conform. Somehow she has managed to stay absolutely herself, while simultaneously taking on different personas and reinventing herself over the years. From the early Sugarcubes days, to the egg-laying swan, through psychedelic, experimental music and to the imagining of new musical possibilities through technology.  As a post humanist I am interested in the links between art and tech, experimental practice, and new relationships between artists and the environment.  As a result #BjorkDigital, now showing at Somerset House, was a must-see for me.

This exhibition was an opportunity to engage with Bjork's latest work through the medium of virtual reality (VR). It takes tracks from her latest album, Vulnicura and immerses you in them; passing through the rooms in small groups, you are able to experience four different songs engaging with them on increasingly interactive levels.

The first piece is Black Lake, written about the singer's recent split from her partner, artist Matthew Barney.  It is shown on two large screens, which wrap the images of the Icelandic landscape around you, sound emerging from fifty speakers in the floor and walls.

As heartbreak songs go, this is perhaps the most personal and painful exploration I've ever witnessed. Moving through caves, volcanoes and moss-fields to a process of rebirth, Bjork emits an agony that is visceral, and reflected in the punishing landscape around her.  The physicality of heartbreak, although felt, is rarely explored or demonstrated in this way; this was a raw primal scream of anguish.  The glimpses of joy at the end, against the backdrop of green mountains and endless skies left a sense of hope and possibility.  It isn't always possible to go to a cave in Iceland when your heart breaks, but this made me kind of wish it was.

Next was Stonemilker, and this was our first opportunity to try the VR headsets, while perched
together on swivel stools.  The comedy potential of 25 people spinning silently alongside each other in a room gave me a slight sense of the ridiculous, but this was soon blown away by the intimacy of the experience.  Bjork appears next to you on a stunning Icelandic beach; you can follow her and explore the scene through a range of angles, spinning 360-degrees.  You get the sense that she is singing both for you and to you; it's a track that implores you to share emotion and be present.  I was glad to be able to blame the goggles for my watery eyes at the end, although I'm sure I wasn't the only one moved by it.

The final two tracks were even more immersive and intimate. Mouth Mantra, filmed inside Bjork's mouth, gives a whole new perspective on the human body; uncomfortable and graphic at times, but oddly compelling.  The psychedelic nature of this one (combined with a slight entanglement with the curtains) meant that this was the one occasion where I did feel a bit queasy.   In Notget, Bjork appears as a giant moth priestess; you are able to move around for this, attached by your headset and headphones to the ceiling.  As the music unfolds, the image moves around you, so that by the end you find yourself enclosed within her body. It was interesting to find that the friends I was with fully embraced this idea and dived in, while I could feel myself backing away, completely overwhelmed by the proximity and physicality of it.

This exhibition surprised me in many ways.  I'd anticipated being impressed by the technology but not moved by it. Yet the intimacy of the methods and potential for self definition and exploration, along with Bjork's capacity for vulnerability, stood out in a world that makes us hide ourselves and our emotions.   It is often said that we are mediated by technology, to the extent that we are not human any more.  Post human thinking, however, encourages us to '...unfold the self onto the world, while enfolding the world within...starting from environmental or eco-others and including technological apparatus.' (Braidotti, 2013).  #BjorkDigital has convinced me that embracing tech as an extension of the self, as a way to redefine our world and relationships, may actually enable us to be more human than ever before.

#BjorkDigital finishes today

Braidotti, R. (2013). The Posthuman. Polity Press.

Water boatmen

They say

that DNA

imprints on water

So when we swim

a million particles 

stream out behind,

like double-helix

microscopic sea horses

And we can never truly say

That we are not the water,

Or that the water is not us.

Yet we wander the world

Like water boatmen.

Skimming glassy surfaces
Testing the tension

Of the violin-bow meniscus

Where desire to live and feel

Can be heard as a low thrum between us

If we listen hard enough.

We want to walk on water
Skate over the warm reflections
Traverse the smooth shores
And ride the waves, when they come

Yet imprint we must
On life as in water
Seek possibilities knowing
We'll leave some part of ourselves behind
Or that we'll crack, and let the water in
Break the tension, break the spell
Change and merge
The plunge will come.
But if not now, then when?

Clothed

I try you on for size

And am surprised to find
I like you.

You're not my usual style
Cut from unfamiliar cloth
A wool-nylon mix of nature and artifice
With warning signs of delicacy
To be handled with care

A fit so close
I catch my breath.
Discomfort and excitement
sensed equally
So that I pause to put you back

But you bring out the colour of my eyes!
And make me dance before the mirror
Take me places I'd never dare go
Before you cloaked me in potential
Enrobed and held me close

I know
One day
I'll pick you up and wonder
If I've stretched you too far
Outgrown you
Or perhaps I'll see you looking better
On someone else

But then I'll just grab you and go retro
Tilt you at a jaunty angle
Turn you back to front and inside out
And like the coast on a cloudy day
Where the sky and sea colours merge
I'll dance the streets
And we'll be so close
That no-one will see where I stop
and you begin.

In blue

I'm walking down a busy high street, in an unfamiliar city, dodging people and glancing into shop windows, when suddenly I realise in horror that I am completely stark naked.

At this point I usually wake up, but this time it wasn't a dream. The busy road was Alfred Gelder street and the city was Hull - and not only was I naked as the day I was born, I was in the company of 3000 other nude people.

When I signed up to take part in Spencer Tunick's 'Sea of Hull' installation my main motive was being part of a work of art.  I seemed to have blocked out the naked part until 4am on Saturday morning when I found myself staring at half-naked people around me and wondering what the hell I was doing holding a pot of blue body paint.  My shade of blue (B1) seemed several shades lighter than everyone else's.  It was the consistency of sun cream, so I pretended for a while that I was on a beach somewhere, and hoped I wouldn't have to ask a complete stranger to do my back.*

I have no problem with naked bodies and am actually rather fond of mine, but wouldn't describe myself as a naturist.  This experience was entirely new and I felt anxious, unable to decide whether it was better to be naked on your own amongst strangers, or if it would have been better with friends. The atmosphere was as anticipated; completely friendly, welcoming, and intimate, in a sex-less sense.  But what threw me the most was the utter vulnerability; that came not just from removing your clothes, but from leaving all your possessions in a park, having no sense of time, where you are, or where you are going to be sent next.

Once we were painted and moving the experience became even more surreal.  The combination of thousands of blue people and 4 o'clock in the morning made me feel like I was in some kind of dystopian dream-scape.  Tunick took us through the first installation in Queen's gardens and at this point we were first exposed (sorry) to his rather bossy instructions: 'If you see a hole, fill it!' he boomed over the tannoy, much to our mirth.

The next three took place in various city centre streets.  At different points we were standing, bending and most painfully, lying down to make waves in the middle of the road.  The last was on the new Scale Lane footbridge, an iconic piece of art in its own right.  It could only bear the weight of 800 people but I was fortunate enough to make the cut; sadly this proved to be literally true, as the bridge is paved with gravel which shredded already sore feet.

By 7.15 am it was all over, and we made our way back to Queens Gardens, I was glad by then to get dressed, not because of the nudity, but because Hull at 5am is really bloody freezing.

I've had time to reflect on the experience since then and am no art critic, but found the following things particularly surprising:

 - being nude feels liberating and transgressive, yet during the time when you are naked you are required to be completely obedient.  To orchestrate a piece like this requires vision and planning to a degree that I didn't fully appreciate until part of it, and Tunick clearly does this brilliantly.  But at a point where you are literally stripped down to your essential humanity, you are also being posed and organised; you have no control over your body for several hours.  It wasn't unpleasant necessarily, but it did make me feel a sense of empathy; there are people after all who experience this through misuse of power everyday.**

- we are social beings.  I know this but am fiercely independent, so forget sometimes that we completely rely on being part of communities and need connections and a sense of belonging.  During the coldest point of the night people started to huddle together to keep warm; strangers helped each other with the paint.  I could never have covered some of my back; I couldn't physically reach.  We have to have faith in others to get to where we need to be.

- rising sea levels mean that much of Hull could be underwater by the end of this century.  As we lay on the pavements, making waves with our bodies I thought about this and Tunick's vision of the sea taking over the urban landscape.  This piece of art is playful but also has meaning; Tunick's recent works have been more political, and this too felt like an important reminder of the impact of climate change.

All in all, it was an unforgettable experience and one that touched me on a number of levels.  The paint has finally gone, but the memories will stick around for a long time to come.


The Sea of Hull will be displayed in the newly refurbished Hull Ferens Gallery early in 2017.  Many thanks to my travelling companion Steve Goodfellow who kept me fortified with rum and good humour :)  For more photos from the event click here 


*Luckily a kind lady offered.  Also thanks to the man who told me I'd missed my eyebrows and ears :)
**I was thinking in particular of the horrific stories of police violence against people of colour here.

Closing the circle

The older I get, the more spontaneous I become.  This is odd because I have more responsibilities than ever, but recently I seem to be spending more time doing things off the cuff and generally having adventures.  This week I booked a trip to Denmark and then decided to go to Margate. Neither place had crossed my mind before Monday, but by (very) early Saturday morning I found myself heading to Kent, so-called Garden of England and home to the Turner Contemporary.

Margate seems an unlikely place for a national gallery, until you make the connection between the town and J.M.W Turner (he spent many years there, and the town is the subject of a number of his paintings).   It looms over the far end of the bay, just behind a jellied eel stall which was probably there in Turner's days too.

Platforma Arts exhibition 'Welcome' was the main reason for my impromptu visit.  Since my visit to Utrecht last year I have (literally) looked at art in a whole new way.  I've always been able to appreciate it, but never felt particularly moved or stirred.  It was only when we looked as art being a thing 'that does', rather than something 'that is', that I made the connection.  Art doesn't have to be a passive thing, a piece of history - instead it can be something that brings people together, that builds empathy, makes social change happen.   This is in fact the vision of the Turner Contemporary, 'Art Inspiring Change.' The whole place spoke of action and connection.

'Welcome' brings together art created by, with and about refugees. The first piece is the beautiful 'New Union Flag' by Gil Mualem Doron,which was created before Brexit as part of a project to design a new UK flag (it feels especially poignant now).  The great thing about modern art is that you can interact with the artists; Doron told me it is a celebratory symbol of diversity, reflecting on the UK's colonial past, bringing together individual stories of difference and acceptance of difference.  It is made up of a variety of materials, from Scottish tartan to Indian silks, overlaid with images of refugee boats. I was left pondering the question, what might change for this country, if we adopted this new flag?

The possibility of a new way of interacting with the world continues in Hong Dam's 'The Butterfly's Dream'. Childhood dreams are written on scraps of paper and placed into a Vietnamese refugee boat; the boat is on scales, as the question is asked - how heavy are your dreams?  Will yours tip the balance?  Hong was herself a refugee, who fled Vietnam by boat in 1979 at the age of eight. Her art has been partly inspired by her desire to explain the experience to her own children, who are immersed i(as all children are) in the familiar demands for new gadgets. By connecting the dreams of different children (and adults) the universality of hopes and aspirations becomes apparent.  Once again the commonalities of humanity are revealed; it is often said that humans share hundreds of 'universals' (traits,patterns and behaviours that replicate through time and across the globe); dreaming is just one of these.  This important piece reminds us of the stories that lie behind the journeys of refugees and the capacity for hope that we all share.

Although the other main exhibition, Seeing Round Corners seemed at first unrelated, there were many connections to be found with the refugee art downstairs.  This installation aimed to explore the role of the circle in art, and moved through different eras, forms and media from 3000 BC to the present day, by artists including Barbara Hepworth, Leonardo Da Vinci, Lindsay Seers, Anish Kapoor and of course JMW Turner.  My favourite piece was Seers' 'Nowhere less now', a film that arcs through various narrative spaces, showing simultaneously on two satellite dishes. Different stories are told by speakers, although it is unclear what is fact and what is fiction; it takes you into a dream-like state where the veracity of what you see, or what you are told is immaterial.

Seers work is inspired by Giles Deleuze; a philosopher whose work was introduced to me in Utrecht and has so far been incomprehensible; however the use of two lenses and presentation of multiple truths has helped me begin to understand his writing a little.  I never thought my Margate trip would be the place where I began to let go of the linear and feel free to move more freely between posthuman ideas, but it was - and in this way I have begun to close my own circle.

'Welcome' is in Margate until 11th July, and Seeing Round Corners until 25th September.

Football grounds visited

Arsenal 

Aston Villa

Barnsley
Blackburn

Bolton

Bradford

Burnley

Cardiff

Charlton

Chelsea

Coventry

Crystal Palace

Derby

Doncaster 

Everton

Hull

Huddersfield

Leeds

Leicester 

Liverpool

Man City

Man Utd

Middlesbrough

Newcastle

Oldham

Norwich

Notts County

Notts Forest

Portsmouth 

Rotherham 

Scunthorpe 

Sheffield Wednesday

Sheffield Utd

Southampton

Spurs

Stoke

Sunderland

Swindon

Wembley

West Brom

West Ham

Wimbledon

Wolves

Random musings from the Leeds canal

My Saturday afternoons are usually spent ironing, working and pretending not to, and following the football on Twitter, usually accompanied by numerous cups of tea and coffee and moaning about the weather.  So it was a real delight to break from this norm and spend today on a barge in the company of poet Matt Abbott and several other writers, as part of Leeds Waterfront Festival.  Despite working in Leeds city centre for ten years I'd never been to the docks *whispers embarrassedly*.  I actually have no idea why because a) I love the water b) I grew up by one of the busiest docks in the world c) I've been just about everywhere else in Leeds.

Matt is a founder member of the very exciting A Firm of Poets and it was fantastic to hear some of his poetry and learn about the writers and lyricists that have inspired him (Bob Dylan, Charles Baudelaire, Charles Bukowski, John Cooper Clarke, and Hunter S Thompson amongst others).  I love the fact that poetry is no longer seen to be the preserve of the academic elite, and that we are gradually reclaiming the spoken word that uses our own accents and colloqialisms (will be writing something in Hampshire dialect very soon :)

During our afternoon on the water Matt introduced a number of writing techniques and ideas, which resulted in a number of random pieces of writing which I thought I would share here.  I'm hoping to keep working on these to sharpen them up in the near future.  Watch this space...

50 word poems

Structure is important in poetry, it goes without saying - and there is something very pleasing about working with the restrictions of form, even when it involves maths.  Here are two poems which I tried (and just managed) to keep under the word count.

On creativity

Greying path of the M62
Leeds concrete
and girls carrying their shoes in the multi-storey
The green of my apple
multi colours of the docks
I wait for the creative spark
that appears with my cigarette
and the surprise of water.

Precipitation

Density of clouds
Heavy as her heart
and full to burst
Reflected mood in the murk of water
Twenty feet down, made closer by the skies
She waits and watches
Til the light comes again
Grey turns to blue 
and the colours dance.

We also looked at alliteration and were challenged to write a poem using only one letter (mostly).  I seem to have a thing for W and here is my attempt:

Winding waterways work their way without waiting
We walk with wonder
while worlds whirl by
in wet wilderness.

When I look at the stuff I've written lately it is fairly clear that I need to think much more about form - so the next challenge of writing a sonnet was a welcome one.  It is proving tricky though, so more of that next time hopefully.  Many thanks again to Matt for an inspiring and productive day.