Drawing and installation on the British Peak District: Self, environment and a mobile working kit

Abstract

This text reports about my practice-based doctoral research project exploring the question ‘How can the relationships between self and the outdoor environment of Bakestonedale Moor manifest in a creative arts practice from drawing and installation?’. I have developed a drawing and installation practice as the bearer and expression of my relationship with the outdoor places of the British Peak District in the vicinity of Pott Shrigley. This led to the development of the ‘mobile working kit’, a collection of modules fashioned from paper, string, wood and fabric, which I use to make drawings and mark the land with sculptural additions. My outdoor art-making events may only last a few hours but I later exhibit its artefacts as indoor art displays complemented by photographs and videos from the outdoor sites. I provide descriptions of two drawing activities outdoors, first, using a three-dimensional fence-like paper sculpture as a drawing surface and, second, drawing on a ground-based paper platform. These examples of art-making are then contextualized in reference to Barad’s concept of intra-activity where material changes in the world are understood to occur in co-constitutional negotiation of all active components. I use this concept and Barad’s understanding of performativity to describe process in art-making and in geological, meteorological and biological changes outdoors. I then relate these positions to current performance drawing in reference to the role of the artist and how the arts practice determines her connection to the outdoor environment.