walk with Dad around care home. Dad sang.
PhD Archive
Welcome to the Phd Blog
Keeping the blog was an important thread in weaving the research, the drawing practice and community facilitation. The degree of Doctor of Philosophy was awarded by the University of Wales Trinity St. David in 2018.
Abstract
The research considers why aesthetics, the subjective ways in which we
experience and value places, and nature’s agency are not readily included in
decision-making processes. This action research adopts a hopeful, participatory
and auto-ethnographic inquiry into the potential for developing and applying a
relational and environmental walking-art practice to overcome this disconnect; an
approach which attempts to reconnect art and life, cultural and natural systems.
Metaphor is used as a method to reflect upon an emergent art practice. The
research considers Felix Guattari’s ideas of transversality, developing an ethicoaesthetic paradigm as a critical framework, taking into account the work of relevant
practitioners and specifically Grant Kester’s arguments concerning reciprocal
creative labour. The framework is developed through a weaving metaphor and
applied to three community-led land-use change case studies; a canal restoration
project, caring for a community woodland and Landscape Character Assessment.
The weaving metaphor becomes both a process and an art work capable of
revealing and helping to incorporate subjectivity into traditionally objective
decision-making processes. As well as facilitating community-wide dialogue, the
research has, in some cases, lead to action being taken alongside nature’s
agency.
The research evaluates the transformation of the art practice and its impact, which
suggests the positive agency of art as a practical aesthetic in a social and
environmental context.
The thesis can be read here:
https://repository.uwtsd.ac.uk/id/eprint/1311/13/Keating%20R%20Landscape%20final.pdf#:~:text=As%20a%20part%20of%20post,with%20people%20in%20the%20Stroud
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The Weave
Walk with Mark Connelly and Simon Smith of the Cotswold Conservation Board, particularly to discuss the synergy with the AONB’s Western Corridor Initiative and the underlying landscape resilience – “natural connections”.
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The Weave
Morning and afternoon walk with Park Junior School and Lois Francis and Tom Keating. Sound recordings made by pupils, drawings and photographs as part of an Environment Week.
Attachments
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First Friday Walk
Walk from The Black Horse at Amberley, two hours in the woods below Amberley, return walk across Minchinhampton Common.
Group included Kel and me, Ffin Price, Molly Scott-Cato, Peter Ashcroft, Anna Spurr, Chris Smith, Sybil Edwards, Lucy Guenot, Pip Heywood, Tara Downs, Martin Large, Eileen Dunlop, Celia Hart (part). Photos by Anna Spurr and Molly Scott-Cato. Drawing part of a series made on “Drawing machine”.
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Folly Wood
analysis of Spring Equinox mapping workshops.
Canal walk with “drawing machine”.
Attachments
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Tutorial
review of animations, planning of Weave presentation and discussion about drawing as performance.
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Art and Geography Network Conference
Day event at Corsham Court presenting work created with Jane Bailey – played recorded mobile phone conversation made along the canal and in Cornwall. Combined this with showing the google presentation. Also “drew a walk” around the house and gardens.
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The Weave
Worked on animation of walk with Steve Roberts – digital drawings over laid on video with separately recorded sound track
