SOUNDSCAPES

‘Sense of Haven and Sense of Hope’ 2023 – 2024

12 minutes 47 seconds

Recorded at Sol Haven, Moulton and Northampton Hope Centre

(Best listened too using quality headphones)

Recorded over one year between 2023 and 2024, using a binaural audio recorder, this soundscape documents the sounds heard and the experiences felt by participants involved in an artists residency programme: Artists in Residence at C2C Social Action, Sol Haven and Northampton Hope Centre https://www.instagram.com/c2cartists/ for which I was lead artist, curator and manager.

Participants were adults in vulnerable situations such as homelessness or being prescribed via social prescription for anxiety or depression.

The soundscape tells the story of a ‘Sense of Place’ at two locations, through the recording of found and made sounds together with spoken word. Sounds were recorded by participants at two venues, at Permaculture site (Sol Haven) and at a centre for homelessness and mental health support (Northampton Hope Centre) Sounds included the noises made by sheep arriving to the farm, reeds blowing in the wind, aeroplanes overhead, chatting and art making noises – such as the scrape of charcoal across paper. Participants also wrote poems describing how they ‘felt’ about these places and spaces and these were recorded on site in different areas (as a walk or within a shed) – as solo recordings and as a group ensemble.

I assembled these voices and experiences into one ensemble piece, bringing these two separate groups together, to tell their experiences of a ‘Sense of Haven and a Sense of Hope’

A Year in the Life of an Allotment Garden
A collection of sounds recorded at an allotment across one year
29 minutes, 54 seconds
2022
Click on image to hear the soundscape on Soundcloud. This is best heard through headphones.

Image:

‘Sounds of the Allotment Garden’
Graphite and Mud on Paper
Site Specific Installation
Kingsthorpe Allotments, Northampton
2022
Many of the sounds you hear are present within these drawings.

 

SPOKEN WORD

Half Ghost
Spoken Word
Written 2019
Recorded 2021

Empty Vessel
Spoken Word
Witten 2019
Recorded 2021

One of the first Spoken Word pieces that I recorded in early 2021 which is part of an evolving and continuing series. I wrote it in 2019, while on top of the X4 bus. A well known commuter bus for workers, students and county lines employees. I remember the view I was gazing at as I wrote about rib cages, It was across to the Nene Valley Way as the bus trundled along the A45. You hit an age and you reflect on what has passed and what might still be.

 

Shaping Poets
Spoken Word
Written 2018
Recorded 2019