Familiarity

Familiarity

I have just come back from a 5 day break in Cadiz. It was the third time I have visited this beautiful city and at last I felt a sense of familiarity with its streets. The first time I visited I remember thinking this was an impossibility.

At home in Cadiz.

The streets seemed to have no plan, they criss-crossed the peninsular, some stopped abruptly in a dead end whilst others opened up unexpectantly onto tree filled squares. In my imagination I had compared this place to a cleaner, friendlier and sunnier version of Terry Pratchett’s Discworld city, Ankh Morpork.

A typical street in Cadiz.

The difference between orientating yourself in a northern European city and this one, 59 miles away from Tangiers, Africa as I see it is one of scale and proportion. The climate and topography are obviously very different and these factors have influenced the evolution of the street system, the buildings and therefore our familiarity with its form.

Details of places once visited become familiar landmarks.

Cadiz gets very hot and one way of creating shady passageways amongst the city is to build taller buildings, close together, so that the sea air is funnelled through the streets, allowing for a cooler more comfortable city environment.

Looking up.

I have grown up in the UK where in comparison, the climate and topography is variable and in general the streets are wider and buildings lower than those in Cadiz and this allows landmarks to be more easily recognised from a distance.

Path in the Botanical gardens.

Whether they are manmade or natural these landmarks have given me a spatial awareness by which I have been able to map my environment. Even in a city like London, the vista is wide enough to be able to pinpoint a landmark and orientate myself. The scale of London is larger than that of Cadiz which is more of a pedestrian or human scale model.

Orientation

One of the difficulties of navigating around Cadiz is that it is set out on a peninsular away from the mainland of Spain. This creates many views through the streets that look similar; multiple narrow streets have a brilliant glow at the end, as the space becomes expansive and the sun on the ocean glints in the distance.

Looking out to sea.

Laurie Lee in his novel, ’As I Walked Out One Midsummer Morning’ described the city well.

‘ Cadiz, from a distance, was a sharp incandescence, a scribble of white on a sheet of blue glass, lying curved on the bay like a scimitar and sparkling with African light.’

His other descriptions of the city are detailed and don’t paint the place as a pleasant destination at all. I am glad to say that it has changed; it is quite beautiful and charming now, with wonderful architecture, food and culture.

Door detail.

But on this visit, once I had relooked at my old map and taken note of the shape of the peninsular and remembered familiar ‘hang-outs’ from previous years, (such as various bars, the beach and market areas), it took me a while to orientate myself but then it was clear! I continued to add information on this trip to my past knowledge of the place and suddenly it felt familiar.

Detail from one of the many church facades.

This was a very comforting feeling to achieve and made me realise once again how important my project could be, connecting people to place through walking, discovering or rediscovering their locality.

Festivals and Rituals

The reason why I have visited Cadiz so often in the last few years is because of my interest in Flamenco. I have always loved the music and costume, so when a teacher offered classes in flamenco movement 5 years ago, I joined up. Four years ago we travelled out to Jerez, a neighbouring town of Cadiz and participated in our first Feria.

The Feria at Jerez is a place to promenade.

The history of the ‘Feria de Caballo’, (Jerez horse fair), goes back to over 500 years ago, when it was the location for a livestock fair, which ran from April to September. Over time it grew in popularity and stands were put up by local wine and sherry producers to sell to the spectators and participants. The specific dates are based on a three week timescale after Semana Santa, (the week leading up to Easter Sunday.)

Promenading by day and night.

People in this area have connected to the place where they live by participating in this event each year, watching the horses parade up and down the park and dancing Sevillanas in the surrounding ‘casetas’. This shared experience of an annual event is valuable to a community in many ways. It can bring people together, build community, encourage pride in a place and also inspire tourists to visit.

Flamenco costume in Cadiz streets.

During my MA study I researched the history of connection to the land through ritual use, including processional movement, symbolic landscape markers and ceremonial gatherings. The feria at Jerez was very interesting to visit with these aspects in mind.

Here in the UK there were many more annual festivals that have been lost. One I am particularly aware of was the ‘Scouring of the White Horse’ at Uffington in Oxfordshire. Thomas Hughes of ‘Tom Brown’s School Days’ fame, wrote a book with this title back in 1859 and depicts the ceremonial annual practice of scouring the chalk cut horse, so that its white shape can be seen with greater clarity from a distance.

The ceremonial path at Avebury has inspired me to paint.

The artist Paul Nash took this photo, he was also fascinated by the chalk white horse.

There is an Iron Age fort up on the hill, just above the chalk figure, it was in this enclosure, named ‘Uffington Castle’, that the festivities took place. His book details all the merry goings on and is an interesting read.

Midsummer

Next month it will be midsummer and yet again I will quietly lead a group of people up along a section of the Salt Way path to light a fire and enjoy being in that moment at that place. Over the last few years it has become even more special as I share the experience with others and they all add their own trace and story to the route.

The section of the Salt Way that we walk at Midsummer.

One lady introduced her daughter to the walk last year and they both shared a very special experience as the sun set and we sat around the fire at the top of the hill. The journey back down was lovely as the lanterns lit up the procession and people were chatting happily as fireworks went off in the distance at the harbour. I am sure this year will be wonderful again for the participants and any potential onlookers.

Migration

Migration

World Migratory Bird Day was set up in 2006 by the United Nations. It was initiated to highlight and celebrate migratory birds and the phenomenon of bird migration. A friend told me about WMBD,about a year ago and showed me the marvellous posters that advertise it.

An image from the WMBD website.

We decided to work together on some ‘birdy/journey’ artwork that we could then exhibit and bring this event to the attention of a wider set of people. We thought we could make some sellable artwork too, as the posters were well designed and a marketing tie-in would help us all. Over time this led to another couple of artists joining us and we excitedly watched ‘Winged Migration’ together.

This clip is one of my favourite parts of the film, along with the eerily beautiful vocals from the ‘Le Mystere Des Voix Bulgares’.

It is called 'The Return of the Cranes’,

After watching the film, all of us more deeply appreciated the beauty and resilience of birds and the incredible journeys that they take, it  was staggering to realise that some birds fly for thousands of miles at heights of up to 3000 feet!

The Easterly direction from which the Brent Geese came.

We have continued to work together and I feel our artwork on display now, as part of the Canterbury Festival, reflects this wonder of birds, journeys, connectedness and resilience.

As I continued to work on my 'People-to-Place' project, I recognised that the bird/journey artwork was very relevant as I had, in my MA research touched upon human migration and the paths they took to move seasonally from one place to another. These routes were what I was now looking for in the environment, in my bid to reconnect people to the places that they live in. Native peoples would have been more aware of migrations as they had to be more connected to where they lived, for their very survival and so, observed and understood seasonal changes in their environment.  We may have lost that knowledge and understanding as we have ‘evolved’ as a species, but, birds and the sheer endurance required to complete their long migrations filled me with awe.

Brent Geese

On Monday this week, I went with a friend for a long walk along Seasalter beach.

Looking towards the Isle of Sheppey, Seasalter Beach.

As I was walking on the foreshore, I thought I could see the white tops of waves towards the estuary, all along the horizon. It was only when we got closer that we saw the white shapes were in fact white tails of numerous floating birds.

Brent Geese, close to the shore.

They were facing due West, into the wind and were fairly quiet. As we walked back to the car, I asked a birdwatcher what they were. ‘Brent Geese’, he said. ‘All the way from Siberia, they prefer our winters.’ When I looked them up this morning on ‘Google’ that I realised they had flown 2,500 miles, following the coastline from northern Russia.

Could this be their tracks?

They will now be our guests, increasing in numbers up to January, mainly eating the inter-tidal eel grass, Zostera spp. leaving our shores in late February; they fly for over 3 months, to return to the Arctic tundra in June.  My father-in-law regularly digs along the intertidal area of the north Kent coast, (for archaeological finds, not bait), and often tells me of the birds he sees.

Looking for clues.

He goes out when the tide is right, all throughout the year and has become very aware of the passing through of many species of birds. Through his passion for archaeology, he is deeply connected to the tides, seasons and migratory habits of the birds in that area. He knows where the eel grass grows that the Brent geese favour, whether it’s a good year for it and all the other plants that live on the marshes. His regular connection with the landscape has given him specific knowledge of the area.

The sign for the 'Saxon Shore Way' path, leading around the Kent coast.

Journeys

I have always loved a journey; it is the path to the destination and a part of the whole experience. I like to explore a map and plan a route, look for landmarks and feel confident I can find my way home/back. I use the same method whether I am driving a car or walking. (I don’t use sat-nav.)

Sheep following a well worn path.

I feel that movement in itself can be remembered, sometimes as much as the physical landmarks. Walking up a hill will be remembered in the muscles of my body, where it felt easy, where I overstretched, where I rested etc. I wonder whether the physical act of walking along a route regularly enough physically and mentally connects us with the environment.

The choice of paths at Seasalter, along the grass or walking along the seashore.

 

Walking along the beach means having to step over every groyne.

I remember reading while researching for my MA that there is a link with movement and body memory. Just as we know that people can learn in a variety of ways, including kinaesthetic, then the act of walking may in itself allow us to learn whilst moving. I will experiment with this, in the next week I may try to learn a new poem whilst walking the same route regularly.

Close up of a groyne post, often holding small pebble treasures in its weathered wide grain.

I know, as a keen dancer, that the more I know a piece of music, the easier the moves within it become. The journey of the dance is led by the music. The music reminds my body of what way to go and what to do. Again, I think back to the ‘Songlines’, the navigable but invisible tracks in the land that allow Australian aborigines to walk for many hundreds of miles through their homeland.  These Songlines were memorised in an oral and aural tradition and used to tell stories of the earth’s creation. The people would walk the path and journey along the Songlines to a piece of narration in the form of a song, importantly the song is set to the speed of the walk itself. This reminds me of my body’s awareness when I dance. Subconsciously it remembers the music, the movements and the full dance. It is in the physical muscle of the body and in the memory of the sound. The dance movements release or realise the journey of the music.

Journeying

This is something I like to do; it is a deep, rewarding human activity and common practice to all indigenous societies throughout history. To journey in a shamanic way is to visit other landscapes, where the destination is unknown, but a clear intention can bring you to the right place. Shamanic journeys stay vivid in your mind, unlike a dream which is intangible and easy to forget. Listening to the sound of the drum which accompanies journeying allows for a more intense experience which gets into our subconscious mind. I may write more about this another time.

Big sky.

(I completed my MA in September 2014 and recorded the last two months of it in another blog called www.thesaltwayfarer.blogspot.co.uk

Please feel free to look at that anytime, as it is from that, that I am where I am now.)