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

A Walk with Thread and Word for The Margate Bookie September 2018

This is a walk as pilgrimage creating shrines for the Margate Bookie September 2018 Led by Elspeth Penfold.

Drawing inspiration from Dee Heddonʼs Walking Library and the book Home Altars of New Mexico by Dana Salvo. You are invited to join me in taking participants and walkers on a journey through poetry, walking, books, Margate and the passion and following that these engender.

I will create portable shrines to the books and the writing of four authors. At selected spots in Margate books will be introduced and then a small shrine will be built and marked with the placing of “Ofrendas” or offerings created by local artists and creative makers ( this might include a chosen reading/performance from the text).

The walking shrines will be a symbolic act, celebrating Margate, and expressing our gratitude to The Margate Bookie, the Authors and their books for the difference they make to our lives.

The authors are:

Elise Valmorbida – The Madonna of The Mountains
PJ Whitely – Marching on Together
Jess Kidd – The Hoarder
Owen Lowery – who will be presenting a multimedia poetry show ʻTransitionsʼ

Each of these authors has sent me artefacts, that have contributed to the writing of their book. These artefacts include, objects, photos and music. The larger objects will be placed on a small portable altar behind a symbolic rudimentary rood screen where we might catch glimpses of the larger artefacts so that they act as relics which have prompted the pilgrimage, objects you might touch but which are at the same time unattainable.

All contributors to this project are invited, to make an ‘Ofrenda’ something that might fit in with the concept, and can be added to the altar as a personal response or offering. It does not have to be costly, the simpler the materials the better. The most important things are that it should be your personal response to the book or books or poems, if you fancy doing more than one, and also that it should be easy to place or carry. You might choose to do a performative reading.

I am hoping you can join the walk , but if this is difficult let me know and I will place your piece for you.

I hope you have as much fun doing this as I am! please get in touch if you have any questions.

[email protected]

For more details about this walk including dates please check out: Eventbrite ticketing info

For a visual diary of a walk for the Whitstable Biennale Satellite program 2018 please see:A long Walk to Nowhere

As I am preparing Along Walk to Nowhere as part of the Whitstable Biennale Satellite program 2018. Here a few thoughts,

I recently completed a commission with A.N.D. ( A New Direction) titled My Creative school, where ten artists were commissioned to work with 10 London schools to bring creative interventions into the teaching by their teachers and also to respond to one of the identified school Development priorities.

The set of cards above was the outcome of seven months of experimental walking, talking and working with the Schools Council, Teachers, Parents and SLT at Churchfields Primary School in Bromley.

I am always elated when what at first glance appear to be quite disparate events within what I do become connected.

The walk for the Biennale was inspired by the work of the Gatwick Detainees Welfare group and their walk for Refugee Tales taking place in July. More about the background to this walk , the work for it began in February of this year, can be seen here: Walking weaving resistance #time4atimelimit

As I prepared our Biennale walk I found this~:

I thought about the need to be playful and reflected on some reading I did about Play as Radical Practice and this quote by Louisa Penfold (Not related) :

‘Changing Play is built upon pedagogic practice that values democratic exchange, uncertainty and difference amongst groups of people’.

It is with this in mind that I have prepared a series of small interventions and games to play as we walk along the estuary at low tide on June 9th.

Details about this walk can be found on the events postings. Looking forward to seeing how we get on tomorrow. Have a great week end.