- Venue
- In Certain Places
- Location
- North West England
“Nothing exciting ever happens in Preston…”
Unsure expectations and a niggling curiosity is what I felt before receiving this book. An artist who I had vaguely heard of but no deep understanding of. No works of his had I experienced previously…
Surprise: not a book tracing the linear development of a project but much more a document within itself. On receiving the book I felt I was holding something precious, ancient and truly special…
The project was undertaken in three stages across a seven month period. The first stage, The Insurance Stalltook place on the 21st, 22nd and 23rd of November 2006. A stall under the historical market roofs of Preston, inviting members of the public to write down and tell mysteries that have happened in their lives, the unexplainable, the missed, lost or unspeakable. For this they would receive a signed insurance certificate ‘against loss of mystery’ and a numbered jar of two pence pieces.
The second stage, Voicing Mysteries took place in March 2007. The 280 mysteries were voiced by Newling himself under the site at which the mysteries were collected, the Market. Reading the mysteries at each of the five points along the central axis of the market place . Starting at dusk, Newling moved around each of the five points, each illuminated, a golden lectern, reciting. Encompassing a ritual… Twilight for Newling is ‘a place where our dreams and thoughts coalesce constructing a place to explore and cross: a threshold.’
The third stage, The Knowledge Meal, took place on the 27th June 2007, 7-10pm. From the 280 mysteries, 40 were selected on being, [according to Newling] incomprehensible to reason and self evidently intriguing where invited to a meal, which again took place under the roofs of the historical site. The construction of the table retraced the path configured in Voicing Mysteries. Objects relating to the specific mysteries labelled and placed along the table.
Tracing paper, as delicate as pages from an old manuscript separates each stage in the book. A collection of photographs showing the people of Preston in exchange and dialogue. Ritualistic histories flow through the project: Market places as sites of exchange, dialogue, meeting and trade, reading(s) in public places, eating and meals: the ritual of the white table cloth, waiter service and a champagne reception, all imperative to this work. The creation of work within spaces, making us stop to think about the ‘market’ again through participation, action and collaboration takes us through that place in between reality and the ephemeral, as Newling states in the book,
‘ To some extent the event is disorientating. This is to experience the liminality that, for me, is constituent of making projects in and through spaces.‘ pg. 15.
Surprise: Towards the end of this book there is a list of all 280 mysteries spread across 21 pages. The private made public. I feel a sadness reading these as many people’s mysteries are associated with loss, death and unfound relatives.
On first glimpse the very last section in the book looked like a page out of my old school maths book. Pie charts, graphs, tables of gender participation, mystery content breakdown: mysteries that contained actions, animals, events, family and transport. I was quite surprised to see this analysis, not something you see too often in the back of an ‘arts and culture book.
It still all remains a mystery to me…
