The Biennial Blog

“The artist walks where the breath of the spirit blows him

He cannot be told his direction

He doesn’t know it himself”

Words by John Maynard Cains – founder of the Arts Council of England

I watched a clip of the man himself speaking these words in “Imagine”  “Art in Troubled Times: A New Deal for Art” on BBC One last week

http://www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/b007ght1

And – although the gender’s not right – the words struck a cord

I set out back in January to map the Liverpool urban stretch of the Leeds Liverpool canal

And along the way the breath of the spirit has blown me in various directions

Imaginatively that is – my physical direction remains constant – up and down the canal

Each and every time I am out on the canal I encounter something new

Sometimes inspiring

Sometimes enthralling

And sometimes disturbing – like the day I watched some boys trying to catch ducklings in a fishing net. When I asked what they were up to they shouted across the canal “we want crispy duck for tea!”

To be honest – there are quite a few things along this stretch of canal that I have found disturbing – and they all are human activity related. Perhaps it’s this human behaviour that contributes towards the canal being an underused green space.

Certain things witnessed become lodged in memory and subsequently cloud perception of place

For example – the man who came from his eldonian canal side home with his dog. The dog did its business. The man bagged the faeces, and then chucked the crap filled plastic bag into the canal – where it bobbed about on the surface until it became entangled in a bramble on the bank edge. 

I wanted to get a clearer and more fair picture of how the canal is actually used by people, so I devised a Human Activity Record data sheet – a means to record every activity that passes by me – not just the disturbing, the entertaining, or the eye catching – but the ordinary and everyday comings and goings of people along the towpath.  

 

I began to record human activity in March – a bit add hoc because the “breath of the spirit” was blowing me all over the place in those early days of investigations.

But for the past six weeks I’ve been wandering the towpath accompanied by artist Emma Kemp – she’s been assisting me in the task of mapping and recording the human activity between Litherland (Red Lion) and Stanley Dock.

It’s a very systematic affair. The canal stretch has been subdivided into sections – 32 in all – and we spend around 30 minutes in each section. Whilst Emma records people – how many – what age – gender – what they’re doing (and if they are dog walking – what breed of dog they have) – I sketch, take notes, have conversations, and take photographs –

 

 

 

 

The man mentioned in the record sheet above told us where to find a blackbird nest –

“just past the elder and in the ivy… If you’re quite, you’ll hear the young calling for food”

By the time we got to the nest – a few minutes after our conversation, the baby birds had fledged. Tail featherless – and apparently flightless – a wide mouthed (still yellow at the edges) youngster hopped about in the nettle undergrowth

  

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Our day out on the 21^st was an interesting one  (actually – all canal days out are)

Wild food – including – strangely enough – a potato patch

If they amount to anything more than a pea sized morsel – they’d pair up perfectly with the water mint that adorns the canals sides – not that I can advocate the gathering of wild fodder along these parts – contamination is an unknown quantity along this industrial and post industrial stretch

We were accompanied throughout the 21st by a heron – his territory seems to be from just north of Millers Bridge down to Boundary Street Bridge. On a good day for him – as today was – he stands like a garden statue on the bank sides opposite the tow path

On a bad day for him he’s taunted by seagulls – it’s not uncommon to witness his methodical and laboured flight disturbed by dive bombing gulls chasing him on the wing and pecking at his feet trailing feet. 

Bedford place to Sandhills Lane is a quiet human activity stretch of the canal – never many people

 

Emma and I will continue our human activity recordings during August and hopefully into September, and when my days along the canal are done I will collate all the data