Sue Hubbard went to Scarborough to see the completed coastal art and nature trail, featuring works by Jeremy Deller, Emma Smith, Ryan Gander, Shezad Dawood with Daisy Hildyard, Paul Morrison and Juneau Projects.
It was a glorious spring day, the sun glinting on Scarborough Bay, the grand Victorian hotels looking opulent against the vast blue sky. For those of us who inhabit the metropolis, it’s easy to become insular, thinking that good art is confined only to London or other major cities, such as Birmingham or Newcastle. But Invisible Dust, under their innovative Artistic Director, Alice Sharp, working alongside Yorkshire Wildlife Trust, has completely upended this prejudice. Commissioning top-rate artists such as Jeremy Deller, Ryan Gander, and Paul Morrison, the Wild Eye coastal art and nature trail in North Yorkshire raises awareness of the need to protect precious coastline and countryside in the face of climate change. ‘Art’, as Alice Sharp says, ‘doesn’t just belong to London. We want to bring quality art to people who don’t normally have access to it. Wild Eye’s mission is to foster a greater understanding of the incredibly diverse wildlife of North Yorkshire’.
Like many English seaside towns, Scarborough has struggled to reinvent itself after its heyday as a top-notch, pre-package tour resort. As a result, unemployment is high and cultural opportunities are low. The Wild Eye project aims to help turn this around by reaching into schools and the community to offer a wide range of art and nature-based experiences, from sculpture by Ryan Gander to watching marine life.
Shimmering against a cerulean sky is Paul Morrison’s Sea Oak. Crafted from water-jet cut, highly polished stainless steel, this large bladderwrack sculpture stands at the edge of Scarborough Harbour. Seaweed has the potential to fight climate change. It grows fast, sucks up carbon and oxygenates the water. This, though, is not simply a didactic work. It offers a meeting place for locals, a spot for romantic trysts and selfie opportunities. The phrase ‘meet me by the Sea Oak’ is likely to become common parlance in Scarborough.
Artist Shezad Dawood and writer Daisy Hildyard have woven together science, storytelling, myth and local knowledge in an Augmented Reality work accessed via an on-site QR code on Scarborough’s seafront, titled Ambiguous Machines. Developed in dialogue with various community groups, schools and scientists, it imagines a future where sea levels have risen and Scarborough is underwater. In this futuristic world, marine species and humans have evolved to become hybrids. Digital characters, inspired by real-life local conservationists, become further imagined in a short fiction by Daisy Hildyard.
High on a headland up by a ruined castle sits Ryan Gander’s lyrically named sculpture: We are only Human (Incomplete sculpture for Scarborough to be finished by snow). Created in the shape of a dolos – those anchor-like forms used as a defence to protect from coastal erosion – the work is only partially finished. The intention is for it to be completed by the time of the snowfall. The fact that it rarely snows heavily by the sea is perhaps a reminder of the Sisyphean task of dealing with ongoing climate change and is unlikely to be completed any time soon. Made of ultra-low carbon concrete incorporating limestone and the skeletons of prehistoric creatures, its unfinished, fragmentary form reminds us in this unstable postmodern world we inhabit that it is much easier to ask questions than to supply answers.
The Turner Prize-winning artist Jeremy Deller is most well well-known for his seminal work The Battle of Orgreave (2001), a historical re-enactment commissioned by Artangel of the 1984 Miners’ Strike and the confrontation that took place at the Orgreave Coking Plant in Yorkshire. (Written about on Artylst under the series Significant Works). Selected for his long-standing fascination with cultural history, Deller has, here, created Roman Mosaic c. 2005, a witty, playful piece sited on Marine Dive; one of the best spots on the English coastline for observing dolphins and porpoises. The Victorian wrought-iron seating area has been newly restored as a Seawatching Station to house his large-scale, Roman-style mosaic, made in collaboration with mosaic artist Coralie Turpin. Cavorting whales, a Roman sailing ship with a smiley face flag, a sinuous octopus and a water-spewing sea god form a piece that is both cheeky and serious. Developed in consultation with locals, it highlights the area’s Roman connections – there are Roman remains nearby. Created in fragments, so it might have just been excavated, it asks questions about the stories we tell ourselves, about how we approach history and what fragments we, ourselves, will leave behind for posterity and what they will tell those who find them.
Moving away from the shoreline, we approach Emma Smith’s commission, Old Friends. Set along Scarborough’s Cinder Track, a historic railway line, now a popular cycle track and green corridor for wildlife. Her multi-sensory artworks suggest that people slow down. Whispering holes in the walls of an old viaduct invite passersby to stick their ears to the stones to listen to the soundtrack of Scably Beck or whisper their innermost secrets to bees, reviving an ancient rural custom. Sited along the track are beautiful sculptural seats and tables crafted from fossilised stone that link the track with the nearby marine area, which led us to moments of repose.
Far from the blue-chip galleries of London, Invisible Dust’s inspiring Wild Eye project shows that art made with mindful awareness of our fragile environment doesn’t have to be homespun; it can be both challenging and reflective. On this trail, set against a glorious coastline, it moves away from the narrow confines of the white cube, from the complacency and pessimism of the art world, into active engagement with the local environment and community. These thoughtful collaborations across science and art create numerous new and surprising connections that might, just might, shift how people think about the dangers to our planet.
Sue Hubbard is a freelance art critic, award-winning poet and novelist. She has published five collections of poetry, four novels and a collection of short stories. Her latest Flatlands, from Pushkin Press and Mercure de France, has just been translated into Italian. www.suehubbard. com