‘Swaledale Gates’ was produced in collaboration with young people from in and around Swaledale. Inspired by the area’s characteristic drystone walls and its woollen products, it explores the connection between people and place. Timber looms have been hand-woven using wool to reflect the colours of the Swaledale landscape and to celebrate the effort it takes to create and maintain communities.
The ancient Japanese calendar divides the year into 72 seasons. Each season comes with distinct names that describe the subtle changes in the weather, flora and fauna. “Spring Winds Thaw the Ice”, “The First Peach Blossoms”, “Damp Earth Humid Heat”. The work is a poetic response to each season, amplifying the natural world through art and architecture.
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Presentation video
Ongoing project
My reflections that gave rise to this project have now been published in a book. It can now be purchased on Amazon.
Since biblical times, the sukkah—a temporary structure giving thanks for the autumn harvest and commemorating the exodus from Egypt—has served as the centrepiece of the eight-day Jewish holiday of Sukkot. This Sukkah was commissioned by the Downtown Synagogue of Detroit as part of Detroit’s Month of Design 2018.
The design of the Sukkah takes inspiration from the shaded canopy of a tree, which can provide a very modest form of shelter that leaves us open and connected to the natural world.
Blue in many cultures is a symbol of celebration. The chosen hue stands out strikingly against the surrounding architecture, highlighting its significance as a symbol of the festival. Inside the sukkah, 300 milled cedar wood tiles are hung from the ceiling, perfuming the space. During the week of the exhibition, the tiles were inscribed with hand-written messages and sentiments from local residents as a means of sharing a sense of ownership of the structure.
The open structure allows in breezes to gently sway the shingles, filling the space with a dappled light and the gentle sounds of a rhythmic chiming, making allusions to the biblical call to celebrate with jubilant noises. At its heart sits a low-lying brass covered bowl filled with water. Light reflected off the water’s surface illuminates the cedar tiles in ripples of light.
Prayer can often be fragmentary. Often the nature of prayer is of a multitude of thoughts, affections and emotions, usually expressed in words. This piece plays on the fragmentary nature of prayer in its composition of numerous brass petals laid out over the footprint of the exhibition space. Each petal is symbolic of prayers said, and prayers left unuttered. The piece is suspended above the ground, almost in mid-flight, showing viewers that prayer is something that bridges earth and heaven. Like a garden, the piece is loose in its arrangement, allowing play and interaction. The form of the petals is suggestive of carrying prayers, even those that are whispered.
This piece references the industrial past of England by creating connections across features of the landscape it traverses. The work will engage the local community in a literal bridge building exercise. At the start of the week, a simple gridded structure is installed over the ground in a wooded area. The structure is made from slender steel rods in an instantly recognisable truss pattern.
Members of the public will be invited to add to the work over the coming days as they see fit. Both public and artist will add to the work by responding to what has gone before. The work will grow and morph into something less like a bridge and more like a landscape.
Spindles of wire will cross, span and bridge the smallest of features. The participants will have to consider every item they choose to install and therefore enter a negotiation with the landscape. Engaging with the work will bring to the fore our relationship with the natural world. Will we build in negotiation with the landscape or in conflict against it?
The walls of the Dover tea rooms mimic the white cliffs in their colour and symbolic stance. The walls fill a third of the volume of Fan bay as uniform mass and unlike a designed habitable space. The spaces of the tea rooms constantly sway throughout the day with flow of summer breezes. They do not resit natural forces but rather, give the space a sense of duration.
The design of the bridge is a combination of contemporary techniques in 3D woven textiles and traditional rope making.It juxtaposes the grandness of infrastructure with the intricacy of a delicately crafted contrivance.
A definition of the word ‘Belvedere’ in the 1590s tells us that it is “raised turret atop a house”. Similarly, this Belvedere is composed of two distinct volumes; a house (gallery space) and a turret (tower). The volumes are separate and distinct, making room for a forrest pathway, which itself becomes part of the ensemble of spaces. The raw timber of the structure emphasises the connection between the heavenward terminus of the tower and the earthbound pathways. The gesture of the Belvedere is a natural exclamation point to the meandering routes through the forrest.
Our peripheral vision has a major role to play in our experience of space. Within an urban setting, our peripheral vision is limited to the tunnel-like vistas of the city's streets. In a natural setting, such as lake, our peripheral vision is stimulated by the openness our surroundings. The architecture of the Lake House attempts to intensify this condition - a meeting of sky, land and water - by drawing the periphery into the architecture.
The Lake house is made up of loosely arranged fragments; volumes that contain different functions, partially submerged below the surface of the water. The lake, becomes the connecting tissue between the volumes.
In bridging between two points, a new relationship is created with the landscape. One that detaches the user from the ground plane. A second relationship is also created beneath the bridge. The premise of this proposal was to give equal weight to both conditions.
The structural concept behind the bridge is to create a balance between structural lightness and density. Like a bed of nails, this bridge transfers imposed loads all along its length, resulting in an impossibly thin and structurally dense section.
Animate (v.) - 1538, "to fill with boldness or courage,"from the Latin: animatus perfect present of animare; meaning "give breath to," also "to endow with a particular spirit, to give courage to," from animus meaning "soul, mind, life, breath or wind".
The spaces in this installation shape the viewer as much as the viewer shapes it. The space is antagonistic space; one that is pushed and in turn pushes back to create a dialogue with viewers. These spaces are animated not only by the body but also gravity, sunlight and wind.
“there is a broader sense of “observation” that goes beyond recording to evaluating. Curiosity drives one to pay attention to one’s world, and as one tries to make sense of it, causes one to linger on some particular feature that suddenly seems to stick out as odd, or beautiful, or strangely hard to explain.”
Denis G. Pelli
A disused coal mine in Svlabard, Norway serves as the stage for an observatory for the northern lights. The shimmering coalface of the mine heightens the experience of the aurora borealis through a very dramatic contrast of light and distance.
This proposal is an attempt to pull the user into the depths of the sky. Two roof lights and a window are fitted with converging lenses on blinds. As the sun traces a path across the sky, the different apertures project an image onto the muted surfaces of the room.
