The Church Farmhouse Museum Attic Collection
This group of artworks is inspired by the Church Farmhouse Museum in Hendon, one of the oldest buildings in the town.
During the summer of 2019 I occupied the space as part of my MA at Middlesex University.
The attic space had not been used for years; an untouched space that still held the marks of its construction and past use. The wood was marked and in some places damaged, in one part of the attic I could still see the old straw insulation. My practice is concerned with disregarded places and at Church Farm my objective was to make artworks in response to this neglected, abandoned space.
The first series of paintings that I made are from rubbings of the floor panels. The more painterly marks are related to cracks, holes and windows in the attic space. These marks are made after observing the space, turning to the east, north, west etc, taking marks from each side of the space onto the canvas. It's almost a kind of routine, standing in the space and analyzing what is there. I introduce a playful element into the making of my painting, perhaps placing marks out of order, or maybe using a dice to decide what to add next, bringing an element of chance into the work.
For part of this project I was interested in animating the space. I created a Camera Obscura installation in the attic, projecting what was outside into the building. From this I made a film, A New Narrative, which combined sounds recorded in the attic, the creaking of its timbers, with visuals projected into the space from the Camera Obscura.
A second film Civil Twilight came from a 24 hour recording of the space projected into the atrium at Middlesex University. I then edited this footage to focus on sunrise and sunset, exploring how light entered the attic. Again combining sounds recorded in the building with the moving image, the film aimed to communicate the long history of this building. Civil Twilight was shown at the Lumen Gallery, London, along with a series of photographs taken in the attic.
