When you live in a big city, especially if you’re a student in a big city, you tend to see what the evenings or the weekends have to offer: pubs, bars, restaurants, cafes, theaters etc. During the Covid-19 lockdown, with all these shut, it became a time to discover the parks, the trees, the canal, and where you ended up if you weren’t trying to get somewhere on time. It wasn’t until lockdown 1 in 2020 that I realised the importance of walking in my work and to my practice. It was then, when walking was all we were allowed to do, that I used walking as a method. Walking around the immediate areas of where I was living at that time – Hackney, London – became a way to discover an area that I was too busy for, before Covid hit. As the pandemic went on, I spent time at home in Newport, Wales, and then returned to London again in late 2020.
This series of works documents life under Covid restriction/lockdown using mapping, collections of found objects, installations, and printmaking. Each work relates to my daily walks in the different locations. Walks from door to door, with no public transport allowed, you couldn’t go further than was reasonable to return from. These works are about my immediate area, places where I couldn’t easily get to and back again, and the routes to and fro.
Over the last year and a half I made three maps, each one of a different lockdown: 1. national lockdown London, March, 2020; 2. the local and national lockdown of Newport/ Wales, Autumn 2020; 3. the January – March lockdown, London, 2021 (work in progress).
Journeys from 94B, 2021
The first map pictured outlines the daily walks that I took between March and June 2020, whilst living in London. I logged the routes on my phone at the time and then stitched the shape of the walks onto a mesh canvas. Each route and day is a different colour. Strangely, as I stitched each route, I remembered the journey. Despite ‘every day being the same’ I remembered each of those walks individually. Even though it is not a traditional map, and would mean little to somebody else, I can read each journey and know where each ends up.
When I returned to Wales, the lockdown was much stricter! Having had the summer ‘off’ lockdown in London, the Welsh rules felt much harsher. Walking became a ritual and a habit and very necessary to daily life. Having just started my final year of university, remotely, I felt very frustrated and annoyed by the situation. So, I walked and walked and walked and walked as a way to meditate and escape reality. Walking in Newport was different to walking in London, mainly because it was much quieter. Even when London was quiet it was still busy in comparison. Everything was much closer and yet much further away. A 5km walk would take you past the town center and further in Newport, whereas a 5km walk in London wouldn’t get you very far. Additionally, there was a lack of people in Newport, there was no one around. I would go for a walk and not meet anyone all day whereas in London, there was always someone.
The second map pictured shows my walks whilst I was in Newport. The same method applies, each route is a different journey and in a different colour. For me, the contrast in these 2 maps lies within the journeys themselves. In London, the routes were much more direct, straight lines and angular corners – just like the roads are there. Whereas, Newport’s map is circular, the routes are more rounded, the journeys are down windy roads and up hills, not all main roads. You can see the change in the landscape in these 2 maps.
The pandemic forced me to think of new ways to display my artwork. I realised that these maps are site specific. I decided to take the maps back to the places where I walked and document them there. This artwork becomes a full circle, of the journeys, the creation, and then the placement and recording of the map in situ. The places I was walking at this time, were peaceful places, open spaces such as big parks and forests.
On my walks in Newport, I had also started to notice things – objects – ordinary, everyday discarded objects. These objects got me thinking, how did they get there? I realised that each object has a story, unknown to me at that time. I found each object really fascinating, not just the possible stories but the shapes and the various forms of decay these objects were in. I started to collect them, unsure what it would lead to but knowing that I found each one interesting.
Newport’s Lockdown Junkshop, Riverfront Theatre, 2020
This collection became Newport’s Lockdown Junkshop. A series of found objects, collected and displayed on shelves that were made with other found objects. Whatever has happened to each object, whatever each story is, for a brief time it became part of my artwork. Being part of my artwork has been added to each object’s story. The installation became a site specific documentation of life at this time in Newport. I installed the work at the Riverfront theater, each object labelled with a title, time, date and location of discovery. I questioned whether each object is specific to Newport. Would I find these objects in every city across the UK or are these personal to my home town?
Newport’s Lockdown Junkshop inspired me to play with the idea that each object I had found, was a deeply personal item to somebody, and these people were looking for their missing objects. Obviously almost all of these items were discarded as rubbish, but there’s something ironic about displaying peoples rubbish publicly, using the visual language of a museum or gallery. It raises questions about the status of objects, and what happens to something once we throw it away? Do we really know?
Lost & Found was a public display of images in Woodland Park, Newport. The installation created a community board – similar to one you might find in a village hall or shop window – of ‘lost’ items. The featured objects were all collected within a one-mile walking distance of the park, so it is feasible that visitors might recognise the objects. The intention of this installation was meant to be interactive, with people recognising some objects or even adding to the board with objects they had found themselves. Although this was left up over a weekend, there was no evidence of people interacting with it. However, there were people gathered around the wall and discussing the images and objects, at points. This installation, again, questioned the status of objects and whether we truly know what happens to something when we throw something away.
Lost & Found, Woodland Park, 2020
I also created a series of monotype prints in response to the particularity of sound when walking. Being in London when it ground to a halt, made me notice things: the silence, the birds, the conversations to be heard, the sound of a single bus, the wind in the trees…. But also no traffic, no aeroplanes, no late night bars, no car horns. Things changed overnight and it was noticeable. Being in Wales, I noticed this change less, it’s always much quieter than in London anyway. However, I started to record the sound of some of these places and the obvious noises that changed. I then printed the sound of them, or how they sound to me. These monotype prints are created delicately, whilst listening to the change in the sound of the city over the pandemic.
Dreamland, monotype prints, 2021
If I look back over the last year and a half, it is clear to me that walking was a way to escape , to explore and to create. The pandemic forced us to change our behaviour. Walking has always been something that I did within my practice but the pandemic made me see that walking is a medium which allows walking to be part of the artwork itself. Through walking, I have created installations that have become site specific and a documentation of the places that I have been in when the lockdowns were happening. The act of walking allowed me to make these installations – walking has fuelled my inspiration and will continue to allow me to make future art work.