Walking with Artists creating new Encounters

THREAD AND WORD – A WALK WITH SHRINES

AT THE MARGATE BOOKIE

A Walk with Shrines, unwrapping, revealing and reflecting.

Elaina Arkeooll reflects on her Ofrenda’ Blue Beard’s box’, Guy Debord and The Book of Proverbs

We unwrapped Elaina’s offering on site, creating our own performative ritual through the unwrapping.

As Ofrendas were placed on shrines we rang a bell to create a moment to reflect on the process.

Here an offering by Elaina who, although unable to join the walk, created an insightful response both to the book The Hoarder by Jess Kidd and the process we were engaged in.

Elaina’s words:

‘Blue Beard’s Box- a response to ‘The Hoarder’ by Jess Kidd

The thread that winds from my practice to this show, and Elspeth’s, Ofrendas ‘ at Margate Bookie / Margate Festival, is cast outwards from ‘The Society of the Spectacle’ Guy Debord.

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I share with Guy Debord the dubious reputation of committing a detournement with the wisdom of The Book of Proverbs 16 ;27-29

27 Idle hands are the devil’s workshop; idle lips are his mouthpiece.[a]
28 An evil man sows strife; gossip separates the best of friends.
29 Wickedness loves company—and leads others into sin.[b]

It might be said that a hoarder barricades the corporeal self within a fortress of things that all become, after the passage of time, and the weavery of cobwebs and whispers of settling dust, of equal weight and value.

The slightest disturbance to the accretions may prove fatal to the fragile reality the hoarder has constructed whereby to withstand the passage of time.

This is Bluebeard’s Box, occupied by remnants of a brassiere, white ankle socks, the collected dander of an electrician’s beard, saved for many months and saturated with the odour of nicotine, a random scrap of lurid nylon stuff, and 1.25mm enamelled copper wire, two or three strands of an ‘cat gut’ saturated with rosin……..a box labelled Evidence addressed to Attilla the rest of the address redacted …….

It proposes that whitewashing never conceals stains without trace. It implicates the cleansing brush of revelation and the implications of exposure and the subsequent consequences.’

Footnotes:

Proverbs 16:27 Idle hands are the devil’s workshop; idle lips are his mouthpiece, literally, “A worthless man devises mischief; and in his lips there is a scorching fire.”
Proverbs 16:29 Wickedness loves company—and leads others into sin, or “An evil man deceives his neighbor and leads him into loss.”

A Walk with Shrines was part of Margate Festival 2018:Now, which was funded by Turner Contemporary, Dreamland and Kent County Council.

WITH THANKS TO ANASTASIA MILLER FOR PHOTOGRAPHY.

A LINK BELOW. TO ANNA BOWMAN’S VIDEO WITH FOOTAGE OF PROCESSIONAL WALKING AND OF OFFERINGS CREATED TO FORM A LITURGY TO FOUR BOOKS BY FOUR AUTHORS AT THE AUTUMN BOOKIE IN MARGATE.

A Walk with Shrines on Vimeo

Drawing inspiration from Dee Heddon’s walking libraries and the book Home Altars of New Mexico, Thread and Word’s Walking Shrines is a walk which takes you on a journey through books, poetry, Margate and the passion and following these engender.

At selected spots in Margate books were introduced and then a small shrine was made and marked with a moment of contemplation, expressing our gratitude to the authors, their books and Margate for the community and the difference this collaborative engagement can make to our lives.

Here a link to Sonia’s reflections as a writer, talking about authors, walking, readers and how to encourage a deepening relationship with literature. A huge thank you Sonia.

Sonia Overall reflects

Sonia Overall is a Senior Lecturer in Creative Writing at Canterbury Christ Church University and Associate Lecturer at the Open University. She brings this experience into her comments and insights on the process she engaged in for A Walk with Shrines.

Sonia has a strong interest in form, intertextuality and the narrative possibilities of place. She has written and abridged work for street theatre and has published two novels, A Likeness and The Realm of Shells.

She is an avid psychogeographer, a practice explored creatively in her poems The Art of Walking (Shearsman) and Drift Deck of cards for psychogeographers, through ongoing academic research and public and invited walks.

She is the founder of Women Who Walk, a network of women who use walking in their creative and academic practice, and creator of the Priory Labyrinth in Canterbury. Her recent walking projects include ‘Walking with Women’s Suffrage in Margate’ with composer Lillian Henley for the POW! Thanet festival; Walk Ways, a sustainability campus project; and ‘O what we ben!’, with Anglo Saxon scholar Mike Bintley for the Being Human Festival. She is currently working on a book exploring psychogeographical pilgrimage.

A Walk with Shrines was part of Margate Festival 2018:Now,
which was funded by Turner Contemporary,
Dreamland and Kent County Council.

Drawing inspiration from Dee Heddon’s walking libraries and the book Home Altars of New Mexico, Thread and Word’s Walking Shrines is a walk which takes you on a journey through books, poetry, Margate and the passion and following these engender.

• 
• 

At selected spots in Margate books were introduced and then a small shrine was made and marked with a moment of contemplation, expressing our gratitude to the authors, their books and Margate for the community and the difference this collaborative engagement can make to our lives.

There is a short video link (14 minutes) of the walk included at the end of Virginia Fitch’s reflections.

Virginia Fitch Takes a few minutes to reflect on the experience of taking part in Thread and Word’s ‘A Walk with Shrines” at The Margate Bookie

Virginia Fitch reflecting on her experience of A Walk with Shrines with images of her Ofrendas made for the book The Hoarder by Jess Kidd, here a link :

Virginia Fitch’s reflections