Lucy Lippard said, “Walking is the prime means by which to experience landscape and place” (Lippard 2007: 42).
In summer 2021 I began Drift:Memory|Myth, a practice-led research project which aims to give women the opportunity to remove themselves from the everyday, and experience walking creatively in the rural environment on Dartmoor, Southwest England. The destination and duration of each walk is decided by the participant, and we travel with a sewing machine and typewriter, transporting these along the rough moorland tracks in a converted pram contraption.
So far, six separate walks have taken place. Each of the six participants and I walked together in a pair, rather than as part of a larger group, to help mitigate against any last-minute covid restrictions.
During these walks, the already slow act of walking is slowed further by the additional action of participants being free to pause and type observations and reflections onto fabric as we go. These fieldnotes record things that can be seen, heard, smelt, tasted or touched – from the weather to the flora and fauna to snippets of conversations of other walkers carried on the wind – as well as individual emotional responses that occur as the walk progresses.
The act of pausing to type creates a feeling of being in-the-moment and connected to place. This presentness is reinforced by another element of the project – a restriction on taking photos or other digital recordings of the walks for dissemination on social media. Alongside providing an opportunity to be removed from everyday paid and unpaid labour, the walks are about being removed from the spectacle. In a world in which we seem to be constantly recording images of what is happening rather than experiencing what is happening, the women who have participated in the project so far, have found it unusual at first to be prevented from taking photographs. Yet afterwards they have noted how refreshing this was. One said she hadn’t realised how much she was constantly performing for the camera, for the benefit of others, and that being involved in Drift:Memory|Myth had given her a chance to reflect on the reasons for this and change her ways of interacting on social media.
It might seem that, in contrast to being within the private spaces of our homes, when walking in a public space, such as Dartmoor National Park, we should feel exposed, and watched. Yet, when our walks are not dominated by our phones, being outside can seem more private than inside many homes today, with the ever-present panoptic internet, the listening ears of global conglomerates, smart televisions, fridges and lighting watching and monitoring our every move, in the guise of making us feel more connected to the world.
By constantly embracing such digital connections we are becoming less connected to the world through our bodies. Drift:Memory|Myth is about creating memories through slow and embodied experiences, and reconnecting to ourselves, each other and the land. By countering the expectation that everything has to be photographed and shared widely and instantly with others, there can be a greater sense of connection and memory making through doing.
At each walk’s ‘Summit’ (the final destination chosen by participants), the typewriter is packed away, and a hand-cranked sewing machine set up. The typed narratives, observations and reflections are stitched by participants onto larger pieces of fabric and become their Summit Flags.
The women who have taken part in the project so far have been surprised to find that it has been the experience of the walks themselves which emerge as the artwork, rather than them being an act of information gathering that instigates the production of a piece for a gallery exhibition. It is the dynamic and ephemeral nature of the process, the dialogue and the embodied experience, not a static final product, which holds significance for them. The stitched and typed Summit Flags become artefacts of the event for participants, prompts for recollection in the absence of their own digital documentation.
(NB a limited number of digital photos were taken by myself for research evidence)
Sarah from Just Sewn Stories
Reference:
Lippard, L. (2007) ‘A Frame for Farming’. In Focus on Farmers. Art and Hill Farming. ed. by Aune Head Arts. Wellington: Halsgrove, 38-45
All images ©Just Sewn Stories 2022