Two of my artworks have been selected by The Roadside Gallery in West Lancashire to be buried for a year, in a project exploring the degradation of physical objects.
The first is an acetate dubplate of my 2010 piece, Audio Guide, which was a site specific composition made for my installation Visitor Centre at The Rea Garden in Birmingham. My residency at the site focused on a pseudo-archaeological dig to collect pieces of broken records from the former industrial space, which feature in the sound recording. This new development furthers the process by re-burying these sounds for a year. Listen to the original recording of the Audio Guide here:
The second object to be buried is a spool of tape from my Music By The Metre project. In the ongoing project I’m filling spools of tape with automated, abstract compositions as an audio homage to situationist Giuseppe Pinot-Gallizio who made his “Industrial Paintings” by a similar method. I’ve always been fascinated by the story (myth?) that Lee Scratch Perry used to bury his master tapes to improve their sound; This is an opportunity for me to follow that example. This tape is a brand new recording which won’t be made available elsewhere until after the year’s burial, for comparison. Pictured above are three of the other spools from earlier in the series.
Here’s some more information on the project from the Roadside Museum site:
In partnership with Pool Hey Farm (West Lancashire), artworks will be buried unprotected in a field at a depth of up to 6 feet, subjected to the elements and developed from the process of interment. The duration of the project will be 12 months. Works will be in the ground for the entire time whilst the above and surrounding land continues to be farmed.
In June 2014, works will be unearthed, documented and in some cases returned to artists to develop further. A public exhibition of the works will then be staged (to be confirmed in 2014) with the additional aim of compiling a limited edition booklet.
Excavation equipment will be on site between 23rd and 27th May 2013 and we intend to complete the burial process over the bank holiday weekend. Documentation and updates will follow.
Further information: Please email any queries to John O’Hare, Gordon Culshaw at freespaceprojects@gmail.com.
On Friday 24th May I’ll be performing at noise=noise at Regent’s Studios, Hackney, London.
