Remembering Indefinable City - Feb 2007

I returned to Stoke-on-Trent after a number of years away, doing a PGCE and spending a year in Japan. I returned to a city where I no longer knew anyone, and one which seemed to have no art scene to speak of. I didn't know that in 2005 two new graduates from Staffordshire University were cooking up plans to open Stoke-on-Trent's first contemporary art gallery.
I was really lucky to have been offered some lecturing on the BA Fine Art course, and although at first this was just a few hours, I was really pleased, as I had applied for around 40 jobs, sent out hundreds of C.V.'s and been for a number of interviews (always seeming to just be pipped at the post by those with more experience).
To supplement my teaching I also found work as a support worker, caring for a wheelchair user in their own home in Llandudno. The job meant I would go to Wales for one full week in three, and then have 2 weeks back in Stoke for my Lecturing and for my arts practice. Having been away I was completely without links or networks, either locally or nationally - and without them felt quite adrift. I was making work periodically, all around ideas of city development and the movement of people in cities, but it was not really going anywhere.
The turning point came in June 2006 at the University Degree Show, where I met David Bethell, one of the Directors of AirSpace Gallery. My colleague had mentioned me, and David invited me to come for a meeting, to discuss the idea that I could curate an exhibition at the newly formed gallery.
I was very nervous and excited when going to that first meeting and meeting Andrew Branscombe, who showed me around the amazing Falcon Works factory -where the gallery was based.
I had already thought of the idea of a show which would ask other artists to consider the areas I was interested in, and a call for work was quickly put together, which talked about the human costs of the regeneration of cities. I was fascinated by the city as a constantly moving target, ideas of palimpsest and flux were important. The size of the main space in the gallery told me that I could be ambitious. The boys (Dave and Andy ) were encouraging, but clear that I could really be experimental, it would be up to me what I might do and they would be there to help me. Wow.
The gallery had secured a bit of funding for their programme (though not much) and they were able to offer me a budget of £500 to work with. Deciding I wanted around a dozen artists I put out the call and waited.
In the end I had 11 artists (and had decided that as artist/curator I would be one of them).  Indefinable  City was underway. Some of the artists selected were already known to me, but others were fantastic surprises;

Niklas Goldbach, a Berlin based artist and film maker put forward his wonderful film My Barrio.
Adam James (in his final year of a printmaking MA at the Royal College at the time) offered prints, a specially built tower and a film.
Polly Penrose put forward her beautiful nude self-portraits, taken by night in work spaces - a factory, an office.
Aside from these there were a number of new works by eight other artists, Ben Frost, Wendy Taylor, Kim Clarkson, Heather Buckley, Emma Roach, James Newton, Ian Brown and me - a mixture of film, stencil work, installation, sculpture and photography. I was very pleased with the mix achieved.
I quickly discovered that some artists are easier to work with than others, it was a real learning curve, with one artist in particular whose ideas changed and moved on at an unreachable speed. This was a challenge, when trying to put together a coherent show.
The Falcon works, though an awe inspiring place, wasn't without its problems.  A February install in a space with no heating, and running on generators meant we all felt the cold, but the excitement, optimism and enthusiasm of the AirSpace team meant it was one of the most enjoyable experiences of my life.

The show attracted record visitors for the gallery at the time, and the positive press coverage and audience feedback created a feeling that even here, in Stoke-on-Trent, anything could be possible.
I learnt a lot in those months of putting the show together. Press releases and artist statements, transport of artworks, damage to works, the problem of too many sound pieces in one space, artists with a different sense of urgency than the installation team, viewers who walked on works or bashed them about, local press photographers looking for the money shot.
Somehow, the finished show looked great, and I could not have been happier. The strange anticlimax afterwards lead me to try to retain my links with AirSpace, offering to write reviews or catalogue essays, getting involved where I could. When a studio space came up (now at 4, Broad St. the cold and constant break-ins leading to a gallery move) I jumped at the chance of becoming a fully fledged member.
The connections made through the gallery kickstarted a career in the arts that had previously been ambling along. Opportunities since have often been (directly or indirectly) related to my involvement with AirSpace. The provision of a space for critical debate and support have been invaluable, and though we have our artistic differences on the whole the projects and events we have worked on together have improved life for me in Stoke-on-Trent, and I hope this is true for other artists in the city.
A lot has changed in the city and in the UK as a whole since 2006. Cuts to the arts mean that it is much harder to keep projects like AirSpace going, and the six years have been hard for many of us, but we have survived so far.
The main thought that we have reached is that as the art world changes, artists need to adapt and change too. The approach taken six years ago, simply cannot work today, but back then we managed to put on a great show with few resources, a bit of cash and a lot of energy. None of the artists involved in Indefinable City were paid for their contributions however, and that is unsustainable as an approach. It seems right that AirSpace is undertaking the Stocktake at this time, just like the city, the gallery is also in a state of flux and change, and presently we are unsure what will emerge from the process, but what we should revisit is that optimism, enthusiasm and energy which we had at the beginning, some of which has waned as we have not done enough to keep ourselves sustained. This process will tell us a lot about our future and what I do know is that Stoke-on-Trent would be a much poorer place without AirSpace. Viva La AirSpace!
Here is a video interview - talking about all the work - 5 years ago!

Indefinable City-2007 from ve strata on Vimeo.

A Walk with Emily

Emily, I am up on the garden festival site, near to the compass where Richard Wilson's lighthouse was.

It is February, but a warm and sunny day. It feels like that moment just before the world wakes up, it has been a time of struggle and hardship, and much has been lost. But there is something in the air, as if it is the moment before a breath.

There are so many tiny birds, some I don't know the names of. I can hear a strange mechanical tapping noise, like a hammer reverberating against a hollow drum. I have to walk right around the clump of trees before seeing a great crested woodpecker. He sees me and stops tapping, before disappearing. I am writing this from the clump of trees, hoping he will reappear.

Small sounds come from the undergrowth and make me nervous, snapping twigs. It could be an animal, large, a rat the size of a dog, teeth baring - about to jump out. I move on.

I am standing on the bridge over the rocky ravine, the bamboo has died-back over winter and more of the rock can be seen, a magpie coughs in a tree above. I see an old man with a boy and a dog in the distance. Something goes wrong with my ears and I can hear nothing but a high pitched whine, and then the sound is back. I suddenly notice the road noise and see the road through the trees, a car alarm, a lorry reversing, a constant hum of the city as it circles this forest.

A man passes me on the bridge, we look and then look away.

Just around the corner I come to the wooden spikes on the hill. There are only 6 left standing now. Again the feeling something is watching me from the brambles, dozens of eyes are trained on me. I am being stalked.

I go off track. There is something red hanging in a tree. A long ago boomerang. I am forced to take a lost path, the brambles and branches have taken this one. They grab at my coat and scratch at my face. I breathe as I regain the path.

But this is the wrong path and I have to double back.

This staircase compels me up, it leads to a round platform, perfect for viewing - what? Something important was here. This spot sends me back in time. I am wearing a jumper dress, my sister a shell suit, we salute each other, a mixture of girl guides and peace hippies. We were never at the garden festival, so I can only imagine other people like us, in hopeful sunglasses, and floral dresses, with a packed lunch in a coolbox, looking for a day out. It rained a lot in 86, but it was nobody's fault back then.

Something has changed here, one of my landmarks is missing and a new path has opened up. It leads around to some moss covered stones like a mini ampitheatre. Back on the path I head towards the trig point. Suddenly the weight of 26 years is clear. This was a bare hill once, with a lone figure standing next to a column. 

The figure was misplaced some time ago, and has become a legend. Now this is an unnatural forest. A wild boar snorts and rampages at the bottom of the hill. I will take another route. Emerging from the trees I hear children yelling, cars, a crossing beeping green, and magpies cackling from every direction.

Standing between two palm trees, a family group comes from behind me, making their way towards what I know is coming; up and over the hill ahead. I linger here in the area which was the labyrinth. I could do with a broom to remove all of the leaves that have fallen on the round wooden feature.

The final remnant on my way out is the paved circle, with flying birds before a red sun. It is overtaken with grass, but seems right. This place belongs to the birds. At least it does today.

Emerging over the hill I am spewed out onto the retail park. Sunday afternoon shoppers milling about in and out of cars into supermarkets electrical shops, fast food outlets. I am back.

A reply from Emily:

I have walked the perimeter looking for an entrance but the previous triangular hole I’ve always used is gone, replaced by high wooden boardings and signs covered with the developer’s name and idyllic images of a development currently halted by the recession.

On my way to the site, I breathed a huge sigh of relief as I drove past (like every journey) and saw that the carcass of the dragon slide was still standing. In my dreams as a 5 year-old, this was the centre of an underwater world in a reoccurring dream, which I glided around, barely needing to swim. The dragon’s mouth was part of a long series of red tunnels full of water that left me giddy even after I woke up, only slightly irritated that the whole of my primary school class had been there to share it with me. Only his head remains now, but his long neck used to be the best part. The site still has an oneiric atmosphere; dreamlike because it exists firmly in the past, in my past, as well as being here, now, in front of me. I feel sure Foucault would say this was a heterotopia linked to slices in time (past with the present and its potential for the future), a perfect example of one of these heterochronies¹.

Cars stream steadily past, surprised to see a pedestrian where there are usually no signs of life. It’s a 30 mile an hour limit along there but I don’t think anyone is sticking to it, I can feel myself bristle on the narrower part of the pavement as each car displaces the air towards me.

My aunt had a job as a busker on the site during that summer of 1984, so I felt hugely important, like this connection gave me power and ownership over the site. My twin sister and I could go in free and spent much of the summer swanning around, sitting on huge pencil benches in an exotic glass palm house, eating funny feet and playing in the ball pool. We also helped Jill out with her songs. Our favourite went like this:

I’ve found a baby bumble bee, won’t my mummy be proud of me. (hold out hand to show bee with a huge smiling, proud face)

OUCH! I was stung by a baby bumble bee, won’t my mummy be sad for me. (react to an imaginary sting and show a very sad face)

I’m squashing up a baby bumble bee, won’t my mummy be cross with me. (grind hands together

I’m licking up a baby bumble bee, won’t my mummy be cross with me. (lick palms as you sing to distort the words)

I’m puking up a baby bumble bee, won’t my mummy be cross with me (exaggerating vomiting with noises, doubtful face).

The song appealed to our disgusting sides and we took special delight in licking our palms with the whole of our tongues, but there were so many bees and so many flowers, that it seemed made for that particular place and time. Now I can see long grasses and a few wild flowers, it’s a sparse landscape, raggedy and kind of torn rather than the plump, neat planting that used to be there.

Walking around the fencing I feel glad I can’t get in somehow, the distance stops the other, more colourful place getting eroded by the reality. It’s a liminal space, neither derelict nor rebuilt, it’s waiting for inhabitants and only half dressed. Without flowers, the brightest colour is the restored Japanese pagoda and tori, which still seem incredibly promising, like anything could happen in that part of the garden. A bit further along I come across the entrance gates and it feels like I could be anywhere, a theme park of the Giardini in Venice between biennials. I can just make out the Mersey across the park and it reminds me how much water there used to be here; fountains, a Blue Peter ship and the Yellow Submarine of course. I can’t place where they would have been, nor can I remember any real plan or ways to navigate the site – I was too young. Now it’s only a memory of excitement and a vague sense of vastness, both in the landscape but also in what was possible there. I decide I like it half-complete because it allows that possibility.

Heading back to my car (parked at the pub at the water) in warm sun – it was always sunny there wasn’t it? - I imagine the padded green arms of a massive liver bird hugging me as my face presses into its soft side.                 

Notes

1. Michel Foucault. Of Other Spaces (1967), Heterotopias.

This text, entitled "Des Espace Autres," and published by the French journal Architecture /Mouvement/ Continuité in October, 1984, was the basis of a lecture given by Michel Foucault in March 1967.

http://foucault.info/documents/heteroTopia/foucault.heteroTopia.en.html

How To Survive

The first exhibition offer of the year came in a couple of weeks ago from Trove, who are taking part in the MAC in Birmingham's allotments project. Charlie has invited an artist (Sophie Bancroft) to design a cabinet, and then has invited 3 artists to exhibit works within the cabinet. Trove have used cabinets a number of times before. The other two artists/groups to be invited to share the cabinet with me are Matt Robinson, who we know as he exhibited at AirSpace Gallery in 2007 with his sick cloud installation and Milk and Two Sugars.

The beginning of 2012 has found me feeling tired and a bit uninspired, and I was thinking to myself maybe I need a break from all this art stuff. The past few years has seen me lead on various projects and events, and at times I have felt more like a project manager, and an administrator than a practising artist. This is common amongst practitioners that work similarly within the public realm: and also I believe, artists that are engaged with group development, who provide opportunities for other artists, can sometimes begin to feel a bit lost in the purpose. I have discussed this with other artists in my network, and they feel the same. So then, how to revive the energy? It seems that independent practice, which provides the opportunity to get immersed in research and making for yourself could be the answer. I thought, maybe all I need is a new project to really get my teeth into. And the next day the exhibition offer came in.

For some time now I have been interested in making kits/packs. Now that I come to think of it, over the years I have always made packs for things: Interrogation saw the artists involved presented with a pack containing costume, i.d. badge, notebooks maps etc. For Hallelujah 2 in Glasgow I sent an artist's activity pack, with instructions - for the artists and public to use during the private view. So, knowing that I want to make a 'How to Explore' pack for the residency in Harlech, I decided that 2012 would become the 'Year of How To.' Where each month I will make a 'How To' Kit. I have been thinking a lot about survival recently - the cuts to the arts have already lead to lots of artists reducing the amount of time on their practice. Some projects I was involved in have already been cancelled or not got the funding needed. So a Survival pack for artists, surviving in the age of austerity, with scruples intact, could be a very pertinent thing.
Therefore, the first kit for 2012, which will go on display in the MAC will be the 'How To Survive' Kit.Each kit box will be the same, and be very plain from the outside, with hand printed text on the box.
Then inside the contents will be objects and equipment which help with whatever the premise might be for that month.Each kit will also contain an instruction manual. Some of the instructions and contents of the how to survive kit are a bit daft, but also there are serious ideas being explored. I am quite pleased with how the kit looks.It will be interesting to see how it is displayed. Now what will February's kit be?

How To Explore

In May myself and Andrew Branscombe will be going across to Harlech in Wales, to take part in the Harlech International Residency, with 6 other artists from Austria, Italy, Macedonia and Spain.
The works made during the residency need to fit into a box: 30 X 30 X 60cm dimensions, and needs to be able to be posted, as the works will go in an exhibition in Harlech, and then travel to different European locations to be exhibited there.
There will also be a series of Skyped sessions within the project, aiming to explore connections and networks.
I am really looking forward to going and having a week to explore Harlech: and have submitted a proposal to make a kit for exploring. Here it is:

Anna Francis will create a box full of the equipment needed to explore. The box will contain a range of measuring devices and apparatus needed for excavating, recording, investigating and uncovering a particular place. Site-responsive works will then be made.

Anna is interested in places, and how we pin them down. She is interested in uncovering their peculiarities and particularities, and is interested in engaging other artists and the public in this activity. Exploring new places is fascinating, and Anna will come to Harlech to use the items assembled in the box and do that. Also, Anna will use the week to create a ‘How To Explore Manual’ which will demonstrate how to use the apparatus within the box. The manual will then accompany the box to Stoke-on-Trent, Lodz and Naples where Anna will aim to persuade an artist from each place to use the box and instructions to explore their home. Anna is interested in asking other artists to reframe the familiar; asking another person to look differently at the place that they know very well, in order to uncover something new about it, and using the ‘How To Explore’ pack to make some site responsive artworks.

AirVent Calendar

This Christmas AirSpace is celebrating by constructing a superdouper AirVent Calendar in the gallery window. We put out a call for artists to create a special box, and then each day of December (until Christmas eve) one of the boxes will be opened.
It's been exciting having the boxes arriving the last few days - some by post, some hand delivered. Kate Lynch is project managing the AirVent - and has a vision of how to bring it all together - a clue in the image above (By Kate.)
I have just finished making mine.
I can't really reveal what it looks like yet - as mine will be opened on day 10.
Also, on the day that the artist's boxes are opened the artist/or art group and their work will be celebrated on the AirSpace website and on social networking sites.
But I will put the image of the work here when it's the 10th plus links to the AirSpace site where all the boxes will be revealed each day - for now here is a description of the piece, I think it's a reaction to being totally skint:

For AirVent Francis aims to draw attention to the frenzied buying activity which occurs in the Festive Season. Families throw themselves into debt, year on year, in the name of something that many of them don’t believe in. The piece ‘Gifts’ is a stark reminder that in times of recession, waste should be measured.

Here it is:

Artists involved will be revealed each day.

Platform P at the Duke

Last weekend I was in Plymouth as I had been invited by curators Edith Doove and Ray White (of Platform P) to take part in their event at the Duke of Cornwall Hotel as The Chambermaid. The Duke is an important historic building, built in 1863, as the Hotel manager told us - to cater for the Railway Station which used to be just outside, bringing people to and from the harbour boats. This explains some of the buildings fantastic original steel work features, which have much in common with Victorian train station design.I met Edith at the Trajector art fair in Brussels earlier in the year. This was really interesting, as the two experiences could not be more different. Hotel Bloom Brussels describes itself as a modern design hotel, and is a sort if swanky 'art' hotel. I wrote up my experience of that event here. But my experience was that the hotels were quite reserved in their approach to art happening in their hotel; whereas the Duke seem to have been willing to really push the boundaries - which is admirable, considering this is a working hotel. The staff at the hotel were really accommodating, lending me a chamber maid trolley for my performance and also cleaning equipment, they were also really friendly, and seemed quite interested and bemused during my performance, even offering me a job.I decided to build on the unexpected experience in Belgium, where I was almost invisible. This interested me. I quite like the idea that my presence in the hotel during the event might blend in - where guests and visitors might be unsure whether I am 'real' or not. In fact, this time quite a few people did not notice that I was doing a performance, obviously seeing me as part of the hotel - asking me for directions to the toilets, or simply ignoring me. I decided this time, instead of delivering room service, which was not allowed last time, or standing silently as I ended up doing, I would make myself useful by cleaning the public areas of the hotel.I was interested in exploring the value that is placed on art, artists and cultural activity. In particular the way that artists are rarely paid properly for their time and work. I was interested in questioning the perceived usefulness of an artist's activity - giving myself the task of doing two jobs at once for this performance - representing a group of artists as curator, while taking up the role of Chambermaid at the Duke - cleaning the hotel at the same time.Most artists hold down a number of multiple jobs in order to pay the rent, while attempting to maintain an active and critical arts practice at the same time, especially in the early years of an arts career, but sometimes throughout.In recent projects I have noticed a particular stance from some members of the public in relation to the funding of the arts - during the recession. Questions of value and worth have arisen - and I have heard, more than once, opinions ranging from - this is a waste of money, to - the money for this project could have been spent on a hospital.I hoped that through this performance I could begin a conversation about the value of my activity as an artist - and find out if my activity would be more acceptable if teamed with something which looks demonstrably like labour.
My question then: 'Is my work worth more if it includes some form of manual labour or industry, or is my arts practice enough?'
Platform P managed to secure funding for the event at the last minute - so the artists and performers did receive a fee, which was fantastic, but makes the question even more pertinent.
Before the event I put out a call for artists to make small multiple artworks in response to the theme of Hotels. I was really pleased with the response, and selected 7 artists works to display on my trolley.The lower shelves of the trolley had cleaning equipment, and one member of the public said 'That trolley was set up by someone with OCD' which I liked.In between cleaning I represented the seven artists and their works, giving out information about the artists and their multiples. This information is included at the end of this post, with links to the artist's works.On the day of the performance I was feeling unwell - having a bad cold. I decided therefore to ease into the Chambermaid performance, by starting on the third floor. This would give me a chance to get into the rhythm of cleaning before talking to the public. I cleaned the book shelves, the skirting boards, the windows, the door handles, the light fittings, the staircase and banisters, the mirrors, the pictures.There were some open rooms on the 2nd and 3rd floor, so every now and again a member of the public would wander along the corridor and encounter me.
Some just stood and watched me cleaning, as if it was a fascinating thing, while others would speak to me, and I would have a chance to tell them about the artists and their works.
As I got closer to the ground floor it got busier. And then came my favourite part of the performance. I noticed that the piano was very dirty, in particular - the keys were filthy.
I decided to give them a good clean. One by one I cleaned each key, which would create a plink plink sound which echoed around the reception area. This brought the attention of the public, one man even came across to ask if we could do a duet, so while I plinked away at the key - he played the other end of the piano. He told me that earlier in the day he had had a go on the piano, which I had heard, he was very good. He said that as he was playing he had thought to himself how much nicer it would be to play the piano if it was cleaned - so he was very pleased about my work.This was the cloth which I used to clean the piano.
I spent the last couple of hours of my 4 hour performance in the foyer area of the hotel. Cleaning and speaking to the public. I became not only curator of the 7 hotel related multiples, and chambermaid but also information sign poster. Members of the public coming in for the Platform P event began asking me when performances were starting, which rooms the works were in, how to get to the ballroom, and what was that piece of work about (amongst other questions.)
Overall, and once rested, I felt very pleased with the performance and its reception by the public. My favourite comment was 'It's really great having you here to tell me about the art works - some of the other stuff was hard to understand, but this is great because you have explained it.'
I am interested in revisiting ideas around the usefulness of artists' activity. I would like to try out other performances where a variety of roles are being performed at once, and where notions of industriousness are explored. The Platform P event was fantastic, and was something I was really pleased to be involved in. I met some fantastic artists, some of whom I hope to collaborate with in the future. I hope that Platform P does another event in the future. Perhaps I will get a promotion next time, and get to work behind the reception desk?
THE ARTWORKS:
Casts - Behjat Omer Abdulla has been working with the notion of identity for many years since he first found himself in a state of exile trying to gain recognition by the Immigration system in the UK. It has been over thirteen years since he left his native land, Kurdistan-Iraq. As a mixed media artist working mainly with drawing, photography, and video installation, he uses his practice to listen to peoples’ stories and try to create a platform for debate around the issues raised. For Behjat, art questions who we are and how we place ourselves in the world. It is a way to be in touch with our responses to life and a way of speaking that allows viewers to translate, decode and change it to their own languages. Here the Chambermaid is showing small sculptural works which capture the imprints of identity, casts in gold taken from porcelain goods which reference the Duke’s luxurious past.
behjaturl.tumblr.com
Divorce - David Bethell is a UK artist based in Leek, in the Staffordshire Moorlands.
Bethell's work is inspired by landscape and the natural environment, often looking at the contrasts and conflicts of human influences on landscape. His work also looks into our aspirations, desires, and our failure to achieve these unattainable dreams. He uses a range of media from performance, installation, object and animation.
Here his piece Divorce takes as inspiration the hotel as a site for romantic tryst. The promise of a perfect fit between nut and bolt is frustrated through the gold plating process. Raising the value of the objects has rendered them incompatible.
davidbethell.com
l'odeur d'hôtel - Andrew Branscombe’s piece responds to the prevalence of Formica as a construction material for furniture in the majority of reasonably priced Hotel and Motel rooms. The work consists of a small piece of wood effect Formica, rectangle, shaped and sized to fit inside a matchbox. The object is promoted on the outside as a car air-freshener to be hung from the rear view mirror. There is however no particular scent other than that of the material itself, which is bland, and manmade. The piece is examining the blank mundane and sterile environment that a mass-market hotel produces, contained within an outwardly exciting package. The piece aims to celebrate the distinctive nature of the Duke.
andrewbranscombe.blogspot.com
Postcard Books – A vital core running through Anwyl Cooper-Willis’s work is a sense of the ridiculous. Exploring how humans jostle and politic, making a way for ourselves in society. The posturing and pomposity, the hubris, the hypocrisy; an image of the absurd.
Here, offers of communication seem to be being made but remain somehow unfulfilled. The messages in Postcards from the Past – on having been Sixteen in their terseness decline to give anything away, and in 23 Postcards of Hotels: 22 Never Sent, the un-sent card itself is a failed communication; the reader must make their own guess as to the circumstances of the non-sending. The postcard, a stereotype of trite communication, is used to confound that stereotype.
acooperwillis.wordpress.com
Art Soap - Kate Lynch’s artwork deals with issues of sustainability and environmental concerns through the use of recycled, salvaged and natural materials. The Artist explores processes of deconstruction, reconstruction and conservation; highlighting historical features and visual histories revealed within the architecture of buildings.
The piece here reflects Lynch’s interests in replicating and appropriating packaging. Art soap is hand made using rosemary, bergamot and orange essential oils which aid creativity by promoting focus and clarity.
Bed Bug – Kim Matias is an artist and photographer based in Bristol, UK. Her embroideries often pick up on the downtrodden, forgotten or grotesque. Celebrating that which is usually overlooked, and finding beauty in the most unexpected of places.
Kim often uses human hair and other collected fragments within her embroideries.
Stay - Glen Stoker uses photography and film to explore the human condition and its relationships with the surrounding world. With a particular interest in the hinterland, both physical and metaphysical, the work often includes notions of journey, walks and mapping.
Stay is a text and photographic study of ten Stoke-on-Trent City Centre guest houses, forming part of a larger body of work investigating the idea that place = space + memories
www.glenstoker.com
Thanks to the 7 artists who made works for my trolley gallery - and thanks to Glen Stoker for the photographs.