Title: Voyager 2000

Project Description:
Three luminous expedition tents cast in aluminium present an emotive image. They speak of a type of lifestyle that few of us are able to truly experience, of exotic places, freedom and a more nomadic way of life. It could also be said of the tent, that it represents a state of mind and the desire for a journey that may be more spiritual than physical.

The context in which these forms are viewed inevitably impact on how they are read and of how the viewer might then consider their surrounding ‘landscape’. Mental comparisons might be made with a notional ‘base camp’ associated with this sort of grouping - the viewer may feel transported to an imagined landscape of snow-capped mountains and chiselled peaks. On the other hand, the viewer may be stimulated to look anew at the ongoing transformations that have taken place over the passing centuries in the context in which they are standing.

Voyager draws parallel thoughts on the methods by which the earth is shaped. From the ancient retreat and advance of ice and molten rock, to the scrapings of mankind; from the microscopic endeavours of tiny organisms, to the encroachment of vegetation – all it seems governed by a shifting pattern of global weather systems. The tents in their silvery form, appear futuristic, perhaps some premonition of future life, yet at the same time they seem petrified, a contemporary Pompeii. The very symbol of the nomad, the transient has become permanent, a monument to a distant event.

Shown at:
Manchester City Art Gallery, UK 2003, Milton Keynes Art Gallery UK 2002, Madison Square Park, New York (with Dan Graham and Mark Dion; organised by Public Art Fund, New York) 2002, Yorkshire Sculpture Park, Wakefield UK 2001,Manchester Art Gallery and at Fruitmarket Gallery, Edinburgh UK 2001