Global Art Project (GAP)

(2018)

Study tour/residency
Publication, A2 (folded to A4)
Exhibition poster, A3
Book/essay, A5, 16pp
Film, 5:20 mins, 16:9

Organised by Central St Martins and Tokyo University of the Arts, this programme spanned London, Tokyo and Hong Kong. Our small group explored themes around history and identity through visits, trips, screenings and talks; as well as collaborating in workshops and public exhibitions in each location. 

Workshops in London and Tokyo, and pop-up public event in Hong Kong.

The programme culminated for me in this printed poster/essay #Seeds, which draws on parallels between native tree seeds and trending social media hashtags as ‘ingredients’ of the natural and social landscapes of both the UK and Japan.

#Seeds, the A2 printed publication, folded to A4.

The first of our three public exhibitions took place in Hong Kong, on the final leg of the trip. We gathered together material and put on Re:mind the GAP in our gallery space at Hart Haus. This was my poster for it.

My film 3 Moments was screened in the show, using footage I had shot along the way. The film reflects on the tension between cultural remembrance and that which gets forgotten or overlooked.

The film is in three parts, each one filmed in a Sunday in the three different locations.
    Shrine, studies visitors’ contemplation and remembrance at the Ueno Tōshō-gū shrine in Tokyo, with the unexpected presence of Dvorak’s Symphony No.9 playing on outdoor speakers.
    Field gazes out across a grassy field in Dorset and reflects on the rise of extremism in the modern world to an extract from Charlie Chaplin’s 1930s speech from The Great Dictator.
   Maids observes hoards of low-paid domestic workers in central Hong Kong on their Sunday off. In makeshift cardboard villages outside the luxury brands, they hang out with friends, video-call their families and trade goods.
   The film was shot on the go and I cut it quickly together in my Hong Kong hotel room the night before the event, so please forgive its roughness!

The film can be viewed here︎︎︎

After Hong Kong, our work was subsequently exhibited in group shows at Embracing Borders at the Chinretsukan Gallery, Tokyo, and Transcending Borders at Central St Martins, London.

On my return I gathered all the experiences, thoughts and inspirations from the study tour/residency and tried to distill them down into this reflective essay book Feel the Distance, and generating the material for the #Seeds publication.