ocean process (2004-2006)
A multi-part installation which deals with the processes at work within the earth's oceans. This was part of a joint project with three other artists, in which we spent a week working along a section of the North Devon coast, gathering materials for a subsequent exhibition at Broomhill Art, Barnstaple.
Water, wind, sun and lunar power. Erosion, deposition, incorporation. Life & death. The ocean: 80% of the earth's surface.
process 3 - rearrangement
42 fragments (cyanotype photogram, 370x290mm, with jar of collected objects)
This static piece shows a short sequence of 5 steps in a process of potentially infinite rearrangement. It is important that the objects themselves are displayed alongside the result of their activity. They are all present in each column, but their position is otherwise undefined. Each column could be read as the effect of a single tide with the objects rearranged randomly.
The objects are what I generally call "sea glass", glass fragments which have been washed up and rounded to a greater or lesser extent by the action of the sea. These were collected over the course of a week in a Cagean manner, throwing the unwanted pieces down "for another day". At first I had no plans for my collection, but the fact that I could be sure that the sea would gather in, rearrange and deposit these fragments with each subsequent tide, led to the idea behind this piece.
Everything cast into the ocean remains in the ocean, constantly rearranged by the tides, but never destroyed.