Blood and Flowers
Slowfall projects will be creating a project space in which to run a series of workshops in conjunction with the Helen Chadwick Blood Hyphen Installation in the Woodbridge Chapel Clerkenwell.
- Slowfall will run 3 days of workshops.
- Each day will have workshops running from 2 - 5 pm
- Each day will consist of 3 activities, in three adjoining spaces each exploring a different element of Chadwick's work. Each activity lasts for one hour.
- Participants can choose any or all of the activities. The activities are interconnected and results of one may be used in another.
Living slides
Each participant is given several slide cases and pieces of acetate sheets. All participants are welcome to help themselves to a variety of materials to trap within the slide case. (e.g. Ink, sugar, coffee, petals, pigment). Participants are then asked to experiment freely in producing a number of slides and consider how the materials ,might change as a result of being projected and heated. When projected they become animated by convection currents and the heat thus becoming "Living" Slides.
Evolutions
Participants are supplied with a blob of clay and begin to create a creature from this. After a short period they select a card at random and follow the instructions on it to adapt the creature. (e.g. grow wings, learn to swim, become carnivorous). This workshop will encourage participants to explore the evolution and change of bodies. At the end of the workshop the participants will have created an creature partly dictated by their own creative choices and partly be random chance.
Flowershadows
In this activity participants will be encouraged to create compositions on light sensitive paper; Rayograms. They will be experimenting with the combination of flowers and body parts to create layers of shapes, textures and opacities. Because these images are created with light and the absence of light they start to resemble x-rays.
Blood Roses Workshop
Workshop participants will be supplied with a section of super 8 film of Roses. The Rose is an Iconic flower and an image of Purity and perishable beauty. Using the various abrasive implements, marker pens and natural materials provided, participants will be encourages to scratch draw and collage onto the tiny frames of Film. By working to disrupt the actual surface of the film, destructive acts become creative and new graphic, rhythmic and thus interpretive possibilities may emerge.
Context
In running these workshops Slowfall will create a project space which contextualises the activities undertaken. This will be achieved through both careful presentation of finished work and subtle manipulations of the space. These will bring to the fore aspects of the space's history as a medical mission highlighting lingering artefacts from that time period and emphasising the connection between the location and Helen Chadwick's work. For example through the presentation on light boxes the Rayograms become reminiscent of X-rays; Completed creatures from the Evolutions workshops will be stored and labelled in jars while slides from the Living Slides workshop will be projected onto the medical curtain in one of the spaces.
Background Information
Exciting developments for Slowfall Projects in the form of a collaboration with the Barbican and The Wellcome Trust. Slowfall will be creating a project space in response to the Helen Chadwick's Blood Hyphen Installation at the Woodbridge Chapel, formerly home of the Clerkenwell Medical Mission. Especially re-staged to accompany the exhibition, Blood Hyphen (1988), is one of Helen Chadwick's most important site-specific works. It has been recreated with support from the Art's Council, the Calouste Gulbenkian Foundation and The Wellcome Trust's Two Ten Gallery.
In this project space, Slowfall will be running a series of free workshops, which will explore different perspectives on Chadwick's work and its relationship to the space. This will continue Slowfall's exploration of how space can be manipulated to magnify hidden elements of a site's history and to contextualise the work within it. To book a place and for further information, please contact the Barbican box office on 0845 1207500.
Last updated on 18th February 2007
