I am a visual artist and researcher working with text, archives, moving image, installation, performance, social structures and object to explore the often-complex relationships between power, people and place.
Western deindustrialisation has meant a shrinking sense of agency and voice for people in historically working-class urban communities internationally. Situated within three post-industrial / industrial contexts of Ford car manufacturing in Dagenham, Cologne and Detroit, my research centres relationships with people and place. This strand of research will focus on field work in Detroit, to develop relationships that will lead to the generation of new collaboratively produced work.
I will undertake a period of site research and field study in Detroit, US, as a way to test my methodology of lurking as practice, and build relationships, that will lead to the creation of new research and artworks in Detroit, US, as a key site for my ongoing practice and research.
Against a backdrop of austerity, inequality and housing crises, where are the possibilities to transfer agency and power to those that don’t have it? Inspired by public service broadcast formats, a series of outputs will be developed through my research, exploring power structures and expertise made collaboratively with people from these contexts, which can be activated to support future change. This proposal would enable me to begin this process through a period of field work to develop relationships, test methodologies and conduct archival research.
My methods start with relationship building, mapping, devising and delivering context specific public workshops and lead to making sculpture, performance/plays, film, knowledge exchanges and publishing. I will utilise ethnographic ways of working through recording, collecting and mapping. I propose to use and test these methods in Detroit and in the studio, as sites of research and production. This research trip will allow me to visit the Global HQ of Ford and it’s archives, researching the history of the workers communities and spend time in Detroit. This will lead to developing relationships with residents / groups that I can begin to work with and continue to over the coming years.
Key research questions:
- What resilient models of practice can be developed that protect artists working within contexts of industrial decline and the communities they are working with? How can these be sustained despite a diminished (UK, Germany) and non-existent (US) public purse?
- Can lurking be a form of artistic practice?
- Can I establish relationships and form a new group that I can work with for a long period of time in a familiar yet remote context. How can the collaborative process be developed through site research and then via at distance remote contact?
This builds upon two decades of working with communities to develop artistic practice, predominantly in the public realm. Since 2003 I have been developing new models of practice within municipal, collaborative contexts – following long term residency approaches that produce outcomes that explore the politics of participation. I am committed to exploring what the artist’s role in society could, and should be, specifically in deindustrialized, often overlooked contexts.