Home and Away 1997
Sefton, Gdansk, and a 1000 year celebration
The city is celebrating its millennium this year and the floor of Koperkiewicz's office is ankle-deep in the paperwork precipitated by it. "Our city is unique in Europe," he says. "Few places have experienced such a complete population transplant. Although we are a fledgling community, we are conscious that we are also the inheritors of precisely 1,000 years of history. Gdansk is both a new city and a very old one."
City Twinning - Postcards from the Edge 1997
"resonance comes out of difference"In 1997, as a result of conversations with John Taylor, the arts officer for Sefton Borough Council, that had begun in 1996 following the scoping possibilities for engagement and exchange with potential partners in Gdansk, an invite arrived for Yellow House to participate in the cultural exchange programme that celebrated 100 years of the founding Gdansk.
One starting point for a project that was exploring the idea of being at home and away, were the obvious points of reference between the cityscape and landscape of Sefton on Merseyside, and the human geography of the Trójmiasto of Gdansk, Sopot and Gdynia.
One such "resonance" is the Sopot-Southport "famous for their Piers", even though Sopot is not a place twinned with Sefton. However the geographic similarities and differences somehow help in the creation of bridges between people in very different situations.
So, it turns out that seaside piers, unlike James Joyce's excellent contention that piers are disappointed bridges, in this sort of creative work these two piers can indeed, poetically, form a cultural bridge between two very different places.
In 1996 Philip Courtenay, Tony Potts and George McKane developed similar ideas and methods under the banner of a creative partnership called;
art creating societyand applied them in a project that was supported and developed by The Glasgow City Council's Arts Development Fund called;
The Glasgow Gates ProjectThis was realised in a performance and installation that took place in a circus tent pitched on Glasgow Green, as part of the Glasgow Fair Festival on 17th and 18th July 1996. The Glasgow Fair is a holiday usually held during the second half of July and is the oldest of similar holidays dating back to the 12th century.
The Glasgow Fair was originally held within the boundaries of Glasgow Cathedral, but from the 1800s onward, the fair has taken place on Glasgow Green when the focus was on the sale of horses and cattle. In our day the fair has become known for its amusements, with circus and theatre shows, and was a magnet for traveling showmen, who could take advantage of the large audiences. In 1996 East End Arts invited art creating society to launch the project in a part of Glasgow with a community with a predominantly Roman Catholic heritage. The resonances between two cities, Liverpool and Glasgow, their histories, and the cultural conditions that include religious divides as well as cultural connections, helped in the devising of work that connected people in interactive performance situations.
In extending these methods and experimentation in the context of the Gdansk Millennium Celebrations, some of the multi-media and film based way of creating an experience for both performers and audience came into its own once again.
The idea of connecting things through "resonance" and the "Sopot - Southport" "pier" thing, led to some thoughts and work about mapping the coast of Sefton on Liverpool Bay and the coast of the Tri-City area in the Pomeranian Baltic coastal region, through the activity and presence of Yellow House participants and performers.
Home and Away
In preparation for the upcoming project in Gdansk Philip Courtenay and Tony Potts accompanied George McKane and Yellow House to various places along the coast of Sefton, including the docks area in Bootle and the sand dunes and pine woods of Formby, and ending up enjoying a day at the seaside resort town of Southport and its famously long pier that stretches out over the sands at low tide. Along the way Philip Courtenay took photos of individuals and the group in these chosen places and then plan was to take these pictures, framed, and take a picture in locations in the Tri-City area, including a day out in Sopot.
On the pier in Sopot and on the pier in Southport
LODE documentation
Mapping the coastal edge - Home and Away
Here is some Super8 LODE footage of Sopot:
A walk from the metro station down to the pier.
Exploring Sopot included the taking of photos of individuals and the group in places that were "similar" and "different" in mapping the new terrain.
Southport Pier
Sopot Pier
Here is some Super8 LODE footage of Wyspa Sobieszewska: Along the coast, a few miles east of Gdansk where the Vistula flows into the Baltic, and at a place called Wyspa Sobieszewska, the Yellow House and the art creating society team were hosted in accommodation set back from the sand dunes and beach that was being enjoyed by holidaymakers.
On the beach at Formby, Sefton
and at Wyspa Sobieszewska
The pinewoods by the beach
In the pinewoods at Wyspa Sobieszewska
and on the beach at Formby on Merseyside
and on the beach at Wyspa Sobieszewska
Here is some Super8 LODE footage of Wrzeszcz: This is the part of Gdansk where the performance was devised and was performed, in a studio space of the Miniature Theatre.
Outside the Miniature Theatre
Yellow House and the performers from the Teatru Wybrzeze
The Performance - a slide show
Perceptions of the City
Later, in the autumn of 1997, art creating society worked again with Yellow House in a project that included Reflections of Gdansk and was launched as an a multi media installation and performance event on 2nd October 1997 at the Netherton Arts Centre.
Netherton
