Dressing the Space
This project has been created in collaboration with student Xiaoxue Chen and the Digital Ambassadors group as part of my recent AA2A Artist in residence project with University of Chester.
Always interested in the materiality of photography historically and our current relationship with the photographic image, I have become increasingly interested in photography as the physical object. For this recent AA2A residency I have had the pleasure of working with the textiles department and collaborating with student Xiaoxue (Anita) Chen to explore the relationship between photography and surface pattern design.
Together we have created a new costume based work, which weaves the history and changing visual imagery of a local historic site, the canal side George Street Pocket Park. The work seeks to celebrate the untold story of Victorian working women who would of kept the local industry & ecology at the time alive, but very little stories were kept about them in the local archives.
I worked alongside local residents and the FACT’s Digital Ambassadors Over60s group, to gather stories and research about the pocket park sites history and current redevelopment. The video work produced shares a series of video bites (works in progress) edited alongside the process of making, which has taken place during this residency.
An exhibition of both works were displayed as part of the annual AA2A artist residency end of year showcase, at Contemporary Art Space Chester, a pop up takeover space in Chester’s central shopping and market centre.
A huge thank you to Paula Johnson and the rest of the University of Chester team, Fiona Huyton and the rest of the Pocket Park redevelopment site team for supporting this project. There are longer term plans to return to the site now it is completed to develop a performance based piece with the costume, and the local stories gathered by myself and the local groups.