Creating Breathing Space

During Easter 2022 I was artist in residence at The Shakespeare Birthplace Trust. My practice explores climate change and wellbeing and the work I produce attempts to be optimistic, encouraging reflection around the subject rather than telling people what to think or repeating the tired images of dying polar bears. I research extensively before making work in response to what I find and how I feel.

During my residency I spent time in the archive and library with books and artefacts, talked to visitors and visited the various locations the trust owns. I like to sit and watch the spaces and how they are used, think about the history, how they feel and how they may change with the seasons.

I was drawn to Anne Hathaway’s House and Garden particularly. Not just the house and the story therein but the formal garden, the orchard and the rewilding occurring. The natural environment features prominently in my work as subject or content. This made me think about the cycles within the year, how those cycles have changed with the changing climate, the production of food and food miles and eventually into how we live in the ‘on demand’ accelerated time frames as opposed to the slower pace of Tudor times.

I was struck by the environmental similarities of the 1600’s and as we currently have temperatures around +2℃ and during Shakespeare’s time we had the Little Ice Age with temperatures 2℃ below average, with both experiencing a major public health crisis or plague.

The work is in response to how Shakespeare used trees and the forest as places of drama, rest, solace, metaphor and transformation. Trees are the lungs of the earth, we need them, they breathe for us, clean the air and provide the oxygen we need to breathe and survive. Breathing Space II is a meditation on this. It is an invitation to stillness. The trees are in repose, leafless but not lifeless, resting, preparing for the spring and new productivity. This rest is vital, we have forgotten how vital rest is for us.

I was struck by how Shakespeare would create pauses and space within his work and similarly how he drew attention to specific drama, theme or words. Breathing Space I is my invitation to you to stand between the brackets and reflect upon what you need to take a break from, a breather, a rest or pause. Stand, sit or lie within the space, between their limbs, and be ‘held’ while you reflect and take a moment or two for yourself.

It sits within the orchard and meadow, within and reflecting the cycles of nature, of rest and productivity of life and decay. The sculpture will weather and change over time becoming part of the environment in which it sits.