and then, a harrowing (with Kelechi Anucha and Linda Stupart)
A harrow breaks up the surface of the earth or the skin, an agitation of soil that has been left dormant too long where the harrow can excavate whatever ghosts, traditions, memories, viruses, melodies and gestures have been buried. The gallery reverts to barn; the barn disintegrates back to soil.
Installed across the grounds, gallery and Amphis building at Wysing Arts Centre, this exhibition includes recent film, sculptural, and video work by Gent and Stupart and sound work by Anucha and Gent.
Navigating wildly between the Arctic Circle, a river in South Birmingham, the length of the Thames, East Anglia, and Greenland, a new installation from Gent and Stupart reflects on Wysing Arts Centre’s location in rural England.
A new sonic collage by Anucha and Gent fills the main exhibition space at Wysing. Built from field recordings and live performances conducted in and near the grounds at Wysing with new recordings of various folk songs woven into the wider tapestry.
and then, a harrowing makes visible how narrative is produced by, and produces landscape, weaving new, intimate, unguarded, and often violent stories and spaces for land in crisis.
and then, a harrowing is supported by Arts Council England and curated by John Eng Kiet Bloomfield. Wysing Arts Centre and the artists would like to thank William Bevan, Tom Dillon and James Holcombe for their support in realising and then, a harrowing.
Photography by Wilf Speller
and then, a harrowing
(Linda Stupart and Carl Gent)
2021
Billboard prints, bailing twine, hay, barley, rags and clothing dyed with turmeric, red cabbage, beetroot and madder, bailing plastic, sacking, hessian, rope, laminated plants, paint on paper mache, chicken wire, found oil painting, miscelanous horse tack, twigs, digital camera, laminated keyring, gloves, false nails, scaffolding tower, carpet, cement, concrete, screed, excavated gallery floor
Be a Gardener. Dig a ditch. Toil and sweat. And turn the earth upside down. And seek the deepness. And water plants in time. Continue this labour. And make sweet floods to run, and noble and abundant fruits to spring. Take this food and drink, and carry it to God as your true worship.
(Kelechi Anucha and Carl Gent. Production by kyle acab)
2021
Audio
Duration: 38min 23sec
A creature is…
… advancing, swallows grit,
… …
…hide nor flesh, goes on feet…
… …
must each time…
(Linda Stupart and Carl Gent)
2021
Tractor, harrow, slideshow on monitor, fabric curtains, beading, holographic stickers, artificial rose and rags dyed with madder
Carl Gent and Linda Stupart
The Grey Cock
2020
Digital video, ink on paper, flour paste, food colouring
Duration: 7min 12 sec
Bucolic Plague
2015
Depopulated water fountain, water, daub
The mainmast and the rigging
2021
Digital video on TV, bituminous mastic, pitch, barley, equine belt, steel, excavated gallery floor with polystyrene
Uncoating.Translation.Hasel-nutt
2021
Digital video on monitor, drywipe pen on glass coffee table, disinfectant hay
Production support and thank yous to Jack, Wilf, Liam, Lucas, Tom, James, Zena, William Bevan, Lyla, kyle, Oliver and all the MERL, Damaris, Hannah, Lottie, and Mandy.