Subtitles

Text installed as sound / Bethnal Green Nature Reserve, London, UK / 2015–2017 
Commissioned by Nomad Projects / Funded by Arts Council England

To the Land was one of five residency commissions awarded by Nomad Projects in summer 2015. The residency took place on Bethnal Green Nature Reserve, a piece of reclaimed land regenerated and re-purposed for arts events and community use. The other writers included poets – David Nash, James Nixon, Sarah Westcott, and song writers – Stick in The Wheel. Writers were offered the use of a writer’s shed.

Extract from residency blog:

The church on this site – St Judes – was bombed in 1942 and after that fly-tipping took hold and the soil became contaminated with lead and petroleum. Fresh new soil was brought in to plant a meadow of medicinal plants and now the remains of St Judes have shaped the earth into a bumpy terrain. The ruins provide unusual microclimates – not usually found in flat ground. Because of this unexpected adaptation, Bumble Bees have been nesting this year.

To the Land developed out of a curiosity about what soil is, how it forms and is moved around the world altering landscapes as it does so. Research included a visual element – a list of dialect words for elements of weather and light which were placed on the outside of the writer’s shed.

Extract from the text:

… At this moment in time, on this tiny piece of land, we might consider the relationship between the trees and the soil a kind of conversation, a dialogue of exchange.

It starts like this: the tree reaches out its roots to find water in the soil and to anchor itself. At the end of each root, a cloud of tiny root hairs takes in water and minerals from the soil.

Meanwhile a leaf falls; rain falls. Underneath the leaf and the rain are a few dropped berries, some dead ants and a small tangle of twigs. This layer of litter helps hold water in the soil by slowing down evaporation.

Blatter

Kelching

Flist

Three Scots dialect words for heavy rain.

The falling becomes a disintegration, an unbecoming, and things start to lose their shape. A rhythm starts to emerge. A dance of mixing begins to happen with mice, snails, ants and worms as protagonists, stirring dead plant material into the upper layer of soil. Meanwhile the tiny bacteria and fungi that live near the surface begin to fragment it, blending it into the layer underneath and creating a different kind of matter that we call ‘compost’ which means, ‘something put together’.

If we could speed up this dance it might look familiar. It might look like expansion and contraction, or like the movement of our breath…

The recorded text was installed as an immersive sound installation on site, embedded amongst the trees, undergrowth and ruins of the Reserve.

The text was performed by Gerard Bell; Lucy Cash; Taylan Halici and Fraya Thomsen

Resonance FM Radio devoted a programme to Phytology’s projects including Voiced.

In 2018 To the Land was included in, The Land We Live In, The Land We Left Behind at Hauser and Wirth, Somerset, UK