I made one last expedition from Highgreen in search of rock art, before getting my head down to several months' hard work, preparing for my final exhibition. I was particularly keen to visit the renowned site of Old Bewick, high up in the Cheviots and rich in prehistoric remains. The main cup and ring marked rock, 'Old Bewick 1a' was what I was after. It was one of the first of such rocks in the country to be recognised as important - way back in the early 19th century.
"Sunday Jun 25 - I arrive at a group of stone cottages in what seems like the middle of nowhere. The rain is torrential. I am soaked. A woman comes out and tells me to park somewhere else. She doesnt know where Old Bewick is. On my persistence, she calls her husband who directs me up the track. How can anyone live so close and not know where Old Bewick is!
I begin my climb upwards in the pouring rain. I am cold, tired and could do with a bathroom. What on earth do I think I am doing? Isn't it time I stopped wandering and settled down? I pass a group of sheep newly shorn, and barely even consider taking their photo. It is too wet, too cold. A steep rounded hill to my left, bearing a sprinkling of standing trees. I look back to the valley below and it is obliterated by rain cloud. Higher up I look again over the valley, and once again see the great Cheviot on the horizon. Higher up on the track I look again, and I can't see it.
At the third gate, it has stopped raining, but the wind is strong. I feel myself becoming weatherbeaten and gnarled in the wind, like the trees. But nearing the top of the track, the wind has almost stopped. Turning right by an old stone wall, I think I can see Old Bewick up on the horizon. A solitary sheep stands proudly on top, like 'The monarch of the Glen', and ... yes, several skylarks begin to sing overhead. Put me on a bleak and remote hill on a wet Sunday and somehow or other I will conjure up a romantic image.
I pause and look around, getting my bearings. I note the signs of antiquity - the tumbling stones, the banks and ditches - and it is obvious I am entering a place of great significance. About to move off, I am slightly shocked to find I have been standing in a circle of small rocks - and shocked again as I approach what I had taken to be Old Bewick, and which turns out to be a huge heap of rotting hay. I must not get carried away by my imagination.
As cold grey cloud descends all around, I explore the area, closely examining the collapsed ramparts of the hillfort and finding the odd marked stone. But I cannot find the rock I am looking for. Scouring the area, tracing and retracing my steps over and over again... and finally completely losing my bearings... I can find no sign of it. I am bitterly disappointed and complain loudly and at length. Pangs of self-pity and self-recrimination overwhelm me. I have come all this way just to get cold and wet. And tired and hungry. I have failed in my quest. I have lost everything.
I turn to go back and wander over to what I know is a concrete bunker. Yes, it is a concrete bunker. Soaked and cold I begin to walk miserably back downhill, and there in my path is a single grey rock the colour of the sky. As in all good quest stories, Old Bewick has appeared before my eyes, just when I thought all was lost. I throw myself against its massive form and reach my fingertips into its ancient carvings. and I sit in its shelter for a long time absorbing the stone. Then I bugger off home."
I stuck this excerpt from my diary on the studio wall as part of my final exhibition: 'I Am Here Now'. It provided the crucial key, not only to the exhibition but to the residency as a whole - from my beginnings when I was desperatley trying to get my bearings, through to my departure a year later.
The diary continues:
"Sun 2 Jul - Out before breakfast. It is going to be a hot day. Greeted by the intense sound of bees and the movement of swallows - all in the same instant. The mist still on the moors is lifting. In the woods I hear distant sheep and a curlew. The trees are motionless. Thinking of the exhibition and the work I have ahead, I feel the need to shift gear, to pull myself up into a different reality, a different way of operating in the world. But I am deeply reluctant. I want to stay in this space.
10 Jul - Aware that time is running out, I make a trip to Hadrian's Wall. I take a tourist bus - then walk. Walking alongside the wall - down below I can see the main road with traffic. I meet groups of visitors - all nationalities. It feels strange, encountering so many people in the landscape, and I contract a little. I dont like it. My experience of the wall seems somehow superficial.
Sun 6 Aug - My last field walk with the Tarset Archive Group, this time around Sundaysight, investigating boundaries, shake holes, bell pits, ditches, enclosures... leaving us, as always, with more unanswered questions than we came with. Conscious how much I shall miss this landscape and these good people.
I have been working flat out for several weeks. So much to do. A huge amount of physical labour. Very tired very often. The practical problems of placing large-scale works in fields and leaky barns seem to be never-ending. There has been some rain. All the time I am working with branches, stone, soil, grass, making new works and maintaining previous ones - all of which address notions of time and the perpetual movement of life.
Sun 13 Aug - The once fresh green leaves have become dull and flat. Over the last month or so, they have begun falling one by one. Now, this morning, I notice for the first time, the ripening berries on the bushes and a yellow tinge creeping across the trees. Yesterday I noticed the full extent of the blossoming heather on the moors, although its delicate scent and its vibrant mauve colour have been seeping into my skin for some time.
A busy period of house guests and preparing for the show has distracted my attention from all this. I am scared I might have missed something. But a part of me, now awakened, has registered it all."
Eventually, the exhibition 'I Am Here Now' opened on 9th September, with perfect sunny weather and crowds of happy visitors. Here are some of the works exhibited:
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The Gatekeepers (collaboration with Wesley White) - seven columns from a single elm, felled about 6 years ago because of Dutch Elm disease. Each piece bears the marks of its unique history, including its interaction with human beings. Green moss and tiny creatures have long made their home in the crumbling bark. And two protruding ends of wire low down show how the tree was entangled in steel cable many years ago, and continued to grow around it.
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The Way of the Swallows - Mixed broadleaf branches found in nearlby woodland, painted yellow and suspended from the rafters of one of Highgreen's large barns. (See The Way of the Swallows under the 'FEATURED SITE-SPECIFIC WORKS' page).
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Moving On - Logs of ash, sycamore, field maple and gean (wild cherry), cut for winter fuel. This is based on the classic 7-track labyrinth, found throughout the centuries in many different cultures. Whereas The Way of the Swallows is looking back to the summer, Moving On is looking forward to the winter time. |
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The sensuous qualities of soft moss on crumbling bark, with a slick of satin red paint sealing cut surfaces.
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Other works shown were the Spiral Mandala and Throughstones, which still remain in situ, if a little overgrown; Portal, a video installation of sky and birdsong, and a sequence of documentary photographs covering the year's experiences.
"Mon 11 Sep - Time to go. The last of the swallows are gathering for their long flight south, with the late summer brood barely a week out of the nest. After all the excitement and action, I am tired. I have people to visit and say goodbye, and 101 tasks to do before I leave. Wet yellow leaves lie on the path.
Thur 14 Sep - Raining all day - I think back to the beginning: stumbling across the moors, wondering why I had left home and family to come to such an apparently desolate place. I recall starlight piercing an immense black sky; the black bats; the white hare under a full winter moon; the two roedeer caught briefly in my headlights, before dashing through the snow into the woods; the rainbows over the high fells, always just out of reach; the morning chorus of a thousand birds in spring; running with a group of learning-disabled visitors through a field of summer buttercups.... At night, I weep into my wine, and lay about listening to gypsy funeral music from Bosnia. It somehow seems the only thing to do."
This account of my residency over the course of the year is not the whole story. I did not spend all my time wandering and dreaming in the landscape, and, of course, everyday life was not without its trials and annoyances. And of course, I haven't mentioned the messy or scary bits. But it was my reason for being there - the part that has inspired and changed my life. Like the trip to Old Bewick, it was a deliberate journey of exploration into unknown territory, and what came out of it, I hope, was a coherent and precise expression of the essence of that place.
'We shall not cease from exploration
And the end of all our exploring
Will be to arrive where we started
And know the place for the first time.'
(from T.S. Eliot's 'Four Quartets)
for more photos or info about this residency, contact lg@lindagordon.org.uk