REFRAINS FOR UNCERTAINLY SACRED SPACES
PHIL SMITH
1 March, 2014
As part of The Walking Encyclopaedia, AirSpace Gallery has commissioned walking artist, Phil Smith to design a bespoke group walk for the exhibition. "Refrains For Uncertainly Sacred Spaces" will expand on Phil's interests of walking and performance and will explore an idea of pseudo-sacred space.
This is a walk in search of pseudo-sacred spaces; these might be the ruins, fabrications, fadings and hoaxes of sacred space; they might include spaces that once were regarded as sacred but have been traduced or abandoned, like a chapel that is now used as offices, or a fake sacred space like a stone circle erected as ornamentation in a children’s play area. We will follow a route of promising possibilities and test out some little moments of transgression and transcendence, nosiness and excavation, while on the lookout for other pseudo-sacred spaces on the walk itself.
This group walk is limited to 20 walkers. The walk will last between 3 and 4 hours, but will not go past 5pm. The walk will go ahead regardless of weather conditions, so please be sure to wear appropriate clothing and footwear.
Phil Smith is a writer, wanderer, performer, and researcher, specialising in making performances based on walking. Author of the forthcoming On Walking... and Stalking Sebald (Triarchy Press, 2014, forthcoming), Mythogeography (Triarchy Press, 2010) and co-author of both The Hidden City Festival Handbook (University of Plymouth Press, 2010) and Walking, Writing and Performance (Intellect, 2009). He is company dramaturg and a founding member (1981) of TNT Theatre (Munich) and a core member of site-specific performance artists Wrights & Sites (Exeter, UK).
As a performer, Phil has recently been working with Blind Ditch This City’s Centre - Here, Now (Exeter, 2013), with dancer-choreographer Siriol Joyner on an ambulatory performance for a visually impaired audience (Cramond, 2013) and is currently working with dancer-choreographer Jane Mason on her Life Forces project. He has created many site-specific theatre pieces and numerous mis-guided walks.
Phil has recently completed research at the University of Plymouth into performance interventions in tourist and heritage spaces and as part of this Counter-Tourism: A Pocketbook and Counter-Tourism: The Handbook (both, Triarchy Press, 2013).
This is a walk in search of pseudo-sacred spaces; these might be the ruins, fabrications, fadings and hoaxes of sacred space; they might include spaces that once were regarded as sacred but have been traduced or abandoned, like a chapel that is now used as offices, or a fake sacred space like a stone circle erected as ornamentation in a children’s play area. We will follow a route of promising possibilities and test out some little moments of transgression and transcendence, nosiness and excavation, while on the lookout for other pseudo-sacred spaces on the walk itself.
This group walk is limited to 20 walkers. The walk will last between 3 and 4 hours, but will not go past 5pm. The walk will go ahead regardless of weather conditions, so please be sure to wear appropriate clothing and footwear.
Phil Smith is a writer, wanderer, performer, and researcher, specialising in making performances based on walking. Author of the forthcoming On Walking... and Stalking Sebald (Triarchy Press, 2014, forthcoming), Mythogeography (Triarchy Press, 2010) and co-author of both The Hidden City Festival Handbook (University of Plymouth Press, 2010) and Walking, Writing and Performance (Intellect, 2009). He is company dramaturg and a founding member (1981) of TNT Theatre (Munich) and a core member of site-specific performance artists Wrights & Sites (Exeter, UK).
As a performer, Phil has recently been working with Blind Ditch This City’s Centre - Here, Now (Exeter, 2013), with dancer-choreographer Siriol Joyner on an ambulatory performance for a visually impaired audience (Cramond, 2013) and is currently working with dancer-choreographer Jane Mason on her Life Forces project. He has created many site-specific theatre pieces and numerous mis-guided walks.
Phil has recently completed research at the University of Plymouth into performance interventions in tourist and heritage spaces and as part of this Counter-Tourism: A Pocketbook and Counter-Tourism: The Handbook (both, Triarchy Press, 2013).
