Yogurt Weaving by Tom Estes
Posted by Tom Estes on Friday, June 1, 2012 Under: Yogurt Weaving
Performance: Yogurt Weaving
Tom Estes’ Performance ‘Yogurt Weaving’ took place on a small hill called 'Dr. Watt’s Mound', the exact same spot where Isaac Watts, recognised as the "Father of English Hymnody" wrote many of his famous hyms (17 July 1674 – 25 November 1748).
Dr. Watts Mound
Isaac Watts was the first prolific and popular English hymnwriter, credited with some 750 hymns. Sacred music scholar Stephen Marini (2003) describes the ways in which Watts contributed to English hymnody.Notably, Watts led the way in the inclusion in worship of "original songs of Christian experience"; that is, new poetry. The older tradition limited itself to the poetry of the Bible, notably the Psalms. This stemmed from the teachings of the 16th century Reformation leader John Calvin, who initiated the practice of creating verse translations of the Psalms in the vernacular for congregational singing. Watts' introduction of extra-Biblical poetry opened up a new era of Protestant hymnody as other poets followed in his path.
The Abney Park Trust
Estes' Performance 'Yogurt Weaving' took place on Saturday, the 11th of September at Abney Park as part of an event organised by ArtEvict.The heiroglyphs over the lodges at Abney Park read, 'The Gates of the Abode of the Mortal Part of Man'. One of the Magnificent Seven cemeteries created in the early Victorian period, Abney Park, extends over 32 acres and was the London Congregationalists pioneering non-denominational place of rest opened as a model garden cemetery in 1840.
The overall effect of building of Abney Park was to establish the most impressively landscaped garden cemetery of its period. The elaborate planting scheme may also be a reflection of the symbolic importance the founding directors attached to the land that formed Abney Park Cemetery. As nonconformists, who treasured the independence of their religious beliefs—and therefore practised Christianity outside of the established Church of England they held the land itself to be of immense significance as it had previously been two neighbouring and inter-related 18th-century parkland estates, the grounds of Abney House and Fleetwood House, where the non-conformist Doctor of Divinity, educationalist and poet Dr. Issacs Watts lived and taught, and indeed wrote several of his popular books and hymns.
In the 1970s, the commercial cemetery company went into liquidation. Burial rights ceased when the private company closed in 1978, and it was not until 2009 that Abney Park became scheduled as one of Britain's historic parks and gardens at risk from neglect and decay. Local people prostested at the closure of the cemetery to the public and the resulting formation of The Abney Park Trust enabled the park to facilitate a wide range of projects in the arts, education, nature conservation and walking/recreation, besides offering new memorial trees and benches where ashes are scattered, and the occasional discretionary or courtesy burial.
ArtEvict
Since its conception in December 2009 ArtEvict has established itself as an open yet critical platform for practicing and emerging artists to present new work in live art, bringing ideas to a forum for discussion and re-evaluation.
ArtEvict @ Abney Park, Stoke Newington, artists included:
Agnes Yit
Lynn Lu
Tom Estes
Kiki Taira
Fabiola Paz
www.artevict.com
http://www.abney-park.org.uk/AbneyPark10Sept2010/Home.html
In : Yogurt Weaving
Tags: live art performance yogurt weaving by tom estes artevictabney park stoke newington agnes yit lynn lu tom estes kiki taira fabiola paz
As an artist I have always leaned toward making Live Art performance work that is participatory or immersive in some way. In my Live Art performance I stage an 'action' and then ask members of the audience to take pictures on a communal camera. In this way, the audience becomes part of the performance, and the pictures are then posted on on-line social networking sites and web sites for another, wider on-line audience.
For me, fantasy and illusion are not contradictions of reality, but instead an integral part of our everyday lives. There is a real Peter Pan Syndrome at play in my work and I suppose I would consider myself to be a carnival sideshow conceptualist, combining a bare-bones formal conceptualism with an eternally adolescent, prank DIY comic-approach.
At the core of this work is an attention to the flickering, fading definition of our lives as dictated by the computer monitor and the rapid reply of instant messaging. I strive, not to break down these introverted, often self-imposed boundaries, but to look at how dataflow from the virtual realm impacts on the significance and symbolism of real-world human senses. But in doing so, I have begun to generate unexpected questions about how art might be able to inscribe itself on the surface of reality- not to represent itself on the surface of reality –not to represent reality, nor to duplicate it, but to replace it.
