Magnetic North Blog

Hi all,

I just wanted to post ahead of the Rough Mix residency starting on Monday. My role is to document the residency for Magnetic North and the artists involved. I'll be armed with an iPad, camera, voice recorder, notebooks and any other equipment I can find to create a record of the ideas developed and of the event as a whole. I'm really excited to get to sit in on such a variety of work.

I'll try to blog as much as I can over the next two weeks and keep you updated.

Katherine

This year's Rough Mix will take place at Tramway as part of the Rip It Up season.  The residency runs from 11th March and there'll be a public showing at 7.30 on Friday 22nd March - more info here.

The artists at this year's residency are:

• Christine Devaney (choreographer)
• Linda McLean (playwright)
• Janie Nicoll (visual artist)
• Miguel Rojo (director/theatremaker)
• Kate Temple (visual artist)
• Bill Thompson (composer)

They'll be joined by emerging artist Sarah Bradley and a group of performers.  The residency is led by Nicholas Bone. 

When I was 10 I spent the year in bed

One day at school, the teacher told us that a new boy would be joining our class. She explained that he was older than the rest of us and that he had been ill and that as a result of this he had spent the last year in bed. This seemed fantastically glamorous to me for two reasons: first, he was being announced in advance by the teacher, rather than just having to turn up at school on the first day like the rest of us; and secondly, he hadn’t had to get up for 12 months. No-one really knew anything about him and even once he started, he had an air of mystery about him: the only thing he ever told me was that he hadn’t had his hair cut for the entire year, which only added to his glamour in my eyes even though he now had rather neatly cut hair. What had actually been the matter with him, I never knew - and I was probably too embarrassed to ask him (the middle class fear of asking personal questions) – but I was fascinated by the idea of what it would be like to just stay in bed. This was long before I’d ever heard of Oblomov.

During these two great weeks I've been aware that while I have managed conversations with some of you and 'soundings' from others, there hasn't been time within our packed schedule to allow for the reflective discussion which would normally form part of the voice process. Also, some of you have asked how you might continue with the work having found an 'opening' through it. Tomorrow we will be caught up in working towards the showing and later we'll disperse, so I just want to say I'd be keen to continue the dialogue at any point, now or at a future date. Should you have anything to reflect back to me which might inform the usefulness - or otherwise - of having this voice work in the Rough Mix project, or any other thoughts or observations, I'd be most grateful to have them.

Looking forward to our last session!

 

 

 

Some books referred to while working on my Walking project as part of Rough Mix

Wildwood - A Journey Through Trees by Roger Deakin (London, Penguin, 2008)

The Pocket Book of Poems and Songs for the Open Air ed. Edward Thomas (London, Jonathan Cape, 1950)

The Worst Journey in the World by Apsley Cherry Garrard (London, Picador, 2001)

One Green Field by Edward Thomas (London, Penguin, 2009)

No Such Thing As Silence - John Cage's 4'33" by Kyle Gann (New Haven/London, Yale University Press, 2010)

Camera Lucida by Roland Barthes, trans Richard Howard (London, Flamingo, 1981)

A Short Walk in the Hindu Kush by Eric Newby (London, Secker and Warburg, 1958)

The Rings of Saturn by W.G.Sebald, trans Michael Hulse  (London, Harvill, 1998)

Rauschenberg ed. Wingate and Florido (New York/London, Prestel, 2010)

Collins Gem Trees by Alaistair Fitter and David More (London, Collins, 1980)