To Stand and Stare: A Somerset Landscape

Friday 11th May 2018

7pm

The Grange (located opposite Clarks Village restaurant terrace, accessed via Car Park 4 (The Grange) for Clarks Village).

To celebrate Somerset Day, the Alfred Gillett Trust is excited to announce a new special test screening of ‘To Stand and Stare: A Somerset Landscape’ which is a work about the meaning and nature of the act of the gaze by mature artists and crafts people within a Somerset landscape – perhaps the oldest of all English counties – that has embodied a particular meaning for its inhabitants over the centuries. Within this work the makers experiment with its form and nature to reflect the nature of that landscape and it only through watching and reflecting that the radicalism of the project reveals itself.

This work appears to centre on the concepts surrounding the construction of values within a rural community (in England) but resonates with how those ideas relate to new ideas generated within the digital age which have been engendered by the unspoken urgency of the metropolis. This story is not told from the standpoint of the young because the young know something of how to speak within the digital and have their own proponents to advocate for them. This story is told from a standpoint where values such as intention, will and creative behaviour that have survived throughout the centuries, may still have value now.

Taking Bill Viola’s aphorism: “Duration is to Consciousness, as light is to the eye” this new film explores how film can be used to raise consciousness when looking at the world with an eye engaged also with David Hockney’s compelling instruction “Just Look!”.

VisualFields is a non-profit Arts Partnership founded by Charlotte Humpston & Terry Flaxton. They endeavour to produce exciting and thought provoking projects that connect ideas around communities and the wider world.

This event is FREE but donations towards the ongoing care and conservation of the heritage collections held by the Alfred Gillett Trust are gratefully received.

Tickets must be booked in advance as there is limited seating available.

CLICK HERE TO BOOK YOUR FREE TICKET