On the one hand the residency is an opportunity for me to focus back on my own practice after so much time working collectively, but paradoxically it is also about expanding the idea of collectivity to acknowledge all the non human elements that surround and infuse us.
Each day will have a brief starting point (words, sound or image). Words might take me beyond words and then hold me still for long enough to notice how one moment speaks to another.
An interplay of walking, writing and making
The 2 week residency is in an incredible location – the most westerly house in England. It faces over the sea to Lands End. The South West Coast path heads upward behind the cottage to the summit of Cape Cornwall.
I forget that it takes time to settle into a place, a practice, a relaxed openness of mind. I have been here before, or near here, a year ago. I arrived by bus in the dark a couple of days early for the Cot Valley Residency in November 2023. The next day I walked without a destination in mind and arrived at Cape Cornwall and revisited again as part of the residency a few days later. The 4 day Residency had me thirsting for more time with the rocks, the sea, the seaweed and the raw elements that cut through the inertia I brought with me from the calm flat lands of Cambridgeshire. Today when I had walked from the cottage to St. Just, I retraced that first walk to Cape Cornwall, watching memories being triggered by recognition and a gentle familiarity and at the same time battling with too much head stuff; a raft of self-imposed expectations and doubts.
Then, close to the cottage. Giant rounded pebbles, a piled carpet of seaweed, the mirror water and the sound of the waves. I began.
