"I like to use words because they come from us. They don't exist in Nature. Even as silent objects, they speak to us. I'm not telling a story, or creating a narrative, or even commenting on the space. In fact, I try to activate the space around the words. Hopefully the viewers will see themselves reflected in the words, in more ways than one." - Robert Barry.

Working over Christmas...

When I got home to the Falklands the ball really started rolling with my practical, ritual processes experiments... with nice weather and the beer flowing (obviously never when I was concentrating on the serious nature of my university work... hehehe...) an ideal backdrop landscape for filming and photography was provided on many an occasion.

I  took in mind pointers that my tutors (the wonderful Bob and Lisa) had given me during my end of term tutorial- to consider biblical font versus the message of the text and the way my aplahabet letters change the viewing of controlled messages, to steer away from my habit of being a little over- ironic, to deliberate on the metaphysical and physical landscapes surrounding the text in my images and their correlation to, or juxtaposition of a sense of displacement... and also a few cataloguing and sketchbook organisation issues which were already underway and just needed more work-

After sitting down and deliberating on the possible stages of displacement throughout my own life, and how certain metaphorical processes invisaged my personal notions of ritual, I creating small notes and sketches depicting the intial ideas for the experiments; and how carrying out or completing these rituals would correlate with my conceptual processes.

I started looking at what I named 'earth experiments'; looking at alphabet letters in natural, wild surroundings and their connections to the earth and the natural elements surrounding them. Using part of a bible quote from FIND QUOTE NUMBER! 'And unto dust thou return'. The photographs really brought out the contrasting colours of the surroundings (the dust really literally incorporated the notion of the wasteland) but unfortunately I couldn't manage to get any good film footage with the wind blowing all of the dust about!

Later on in the evening I tried a similiar experiment using the modernised version of the Exodus 3.14, 'I am that I am' to bring out the sublimity of the free, open landscape outside of my house... although perhaps the lighting did not bring out the contrasting colours as well, it was still an interesting experiment to try;

I also tried with a non- Biblical quote, placing the letters reading 'Come Home' outside the  gate, the threshold of my parents house (obvious alliteration, but I wanted again to play around with the visual qualitites and contrast colours whilst I had the chance);

The next experiment was (quite fun to carry out although not particuarly effective) to run over the alphabet letters with the landrover... but unfortunately I underestimated the swampiness of the wet ground, and the letters sank into the ground rather than being squashed or broken like I had anticipated. The letters did leave a few light imprints in the ground after several increasingly frustrated attempts of reversing over them, but overall it was not an effective method of experiementing with ritual process...

This next experiment became the initial experiment for my determined ritualistic direction, and gave me a chance to iron out any problematic issues before I tried to do it again...
For an entire evening I melted candles over alphabet letters, and photographed the ensuing results. I began the experiment with two candles, one with letters reading 'light' at its base, and the other (the longer candle) 'darkness'. However I only got as far as manually melting the 'light' candle, as the process was so time-consuming and labourious that I took up my Dad's suggestion to use a handheld blowtorch to melt the second candle.
Melting wax over the letters proved to be very visually effective for my photographs (and highlighted the dedication to time-consuming ritual that occupies my day to day life, not to mention embodying metaphors of light and darkness, etc) but I decided that a second experiment, filming the melting wax of the second camera whilst melting it down with a blowtorch would give the experiement both speed and edge.

The second experiment of wax melting really exemplified my visual notions of ritual process in the wasteland, and the sped up film of the wax melting outside my house with the dappled sunlight reflecting through the wind blown trees on to the wax really added a sense of movement to the experiment. We accidentally began to melt the alphabet letters whilst burning the wax down, but it resulted in a fascinated effect that I intend to focus upon and pursue throughout my future works;

 (N.B due to lost footage, which was again found, Dad and I melted a second, round candle down, burning it until the alphabet letters set alight and melted into a bubbling mass which was an amazingly powerful image and seemed to  me as though we were burning the message away; and DISSOLVING LANGUAGE)

Even though this previous experiment made my mind up about what ritual notions that I wanted to continue exploring, I carried on experimenting with other ideas; through 'water' and 'burying'. It has become increasingly apparent how natural elements both change and direct my ritualistic processes, bringing ideals of home and belonging into my displacement, whilst simultaneously altering my conceptual notions and constraints).

Using earth from Dad's newly dug flowerbeds (I like to recycle :P) I played around with 'burying' (or more accurately, covering, hiding) alphabet letters, and looking at how concealing physical parts of the letters themselves changed the visual qualities, and the message itself. I also took some landscaped images of the letters stuck into the soil next to a pool of water... playing with visuals rather than focusing on concepts that I usually centre on and forget the physical, literal qualities of my work...

Following on the theme of ritual process I experiemented with placing alphabet letters in water, (harking a little to baptism, cleasning rituals and the washing away of sin, of fear and doubt... maybe) an experiment which I tried out in three different locations around East Falklands; Darwin, Stanley and the Van Tan.
I photographed the letters (which you might've noticed that I've glued and stuck on to cocktail sticks to elevate, or 'stick' them into the landscapes) firstly in the sea at Darwin Harbour, focusing on the movement of the tide and the rippling of the water. Then, although with a far more unsuccessful outcome than I had anticipated, I tried to take similar images in Felton's Stream at the Stanley Golfcourse. However, the water had dried up considerably from the bottle experiements I had sailed on it last year for a previous project, and the fresh water had been contaminated with salt water, so the murky brown depths didn't give me the contrasting colours I was searching for (I also had a slight tantrum with the cocktail sticks, and ended up trying a few images of submerged letters...). I then got the chance to go up to the slightly more remote Van Tan, a landscape which really magnified the atmosphere that I was looking for. Due to the rugged landscape and clear, fast- moving waters and minature waterfalls I was finally provided with the chance to experiment with water texture and the smooth, matte surfaces of the alphabet letters (and  I got to wade into the stream and walk along it barefoot, so some naturalistic fun was included!). These experiments were enjoyable to carry out, and have helped me determine and focus upon the particular ritual process that identifies with my notions of identifying and overcoming feelings of displacement, and the resulting concepts of ritual in the wasteland...

THIRD YEAR INTERIM SHOW

Here are a few images from the first term interim show, set up in the style of the Royal Academy Summer Shows, our 'Academy Show' consists of a bulk collection of our experiements, contextual research, sketches, intial images and statements (displayed like Frazer Muggeridge graphic collage pages... an experiement for additional pages in our Degree Show Catalogue)...Enjoy!