As Above, So Below
A collaborative Site Singing artist residency
Work in progress in the crypt: Sun 7th – Weds 10th October, open 15:00 – 18:00 daily
Closing event in the crypt: Thursday 11th October, 19:00 – 22:00, with very special guest performance by Il Santo Bevitore (London)
Entry – by donation
‘As Above, So below…The concept was first laid out in the Emerald Tablet of Hermes Trismegistus: “That which is Below corresponds to that which is Above, and that which is Above, corresponds to that which is Below, to accomplish the miracles of the One Thing.”
Phrase: as above, so below (occultism): What happens on one level of reality also happens on every other level; the microcosm and macrocosm behave alike.’ wiktionary.org
Between the 7th and the 11th of October 2018, two interdisciplinary artists will take up a site-specific residency in the crypt (lower church) and the upper church of St John on the Wall, Bristol.
Markus Feiler (b 1977, resident in Berlin) and Ellen Southern (b 1977, resident in Bristol) will together explore these atmospheric spaces, producing both sound and visual art. Work in progress will be presented to visitors in the form of installations in the crypt, which will be altered and developed day by day.
The artists will work together to make new pieces for and about the spaces and their surrounds, offering visitors an alternative, creative and sensory forms of interpretation with which to experience this historical site anew.
The collaboration will culminate in an evening exhibition and live event to mark the closing of the residency, on Thursday the 11th October. The event will be raising funds for the Churches Conservation Trust, who care for this beautiful church. The artists will be joined by a very special guest: London-based Il Santo Bevitore. Inspired by ancient rites and practices, he continues his ethnomusicological research on ethnic electronics. He will present his latest release, ‘Realm of consciousness’, an exploration about the theme of percussions and shamanism, the connection between each others, using repetition codes as a key to hypnotise and trance the listener. This work aims to blur the distance between practitioner and listener.
https://ilsantobevitore.bandcamp.com/album/realm-of-consciousness
About the collaboration
Feiler and Southern first met in Bristol in 2015 when Feiler was passing through Bristol and visited the artist-run Centrespace gallery where Southern was invigilating. After exchanging contacts at this brief initial meeting, the artists became ‘pen pals’ via email.
Feiler invited Southern to take part in a group exhibition Exit Strategies: Individual Utopias, which he was curating at the RAW-Gelände, Berlin in December 2017 with fellow artists Anke Droste (painting/text-video), Marion Richter (installation), and Andrea Spickermann (sound-installation).
https://markusfeiler.com/exit_strategies/ .
In inviting Feiler to return to Bristol, and to exhibit together just minutes from where they first met, As Above So Below completes the circle of mutual artistic exchange and inspiration.
About the artists
Markus Feiler (Berlin, Germany)
„I did not start to make art. I started to give room, to give form.“ With his artworks and art projects, Markus provides spaces – spaces for sensuality, perception, thinking, exploring, questioning. His artistic work reflects on conscious and unconscious facets of our existence. He examines transitions as well as the transformative, which encompass the formless, the form-giving and the form itself.
Artist homepage: https://markusfeiler.com/en/home/
Twitter: https://twitter.com/markusfeilerart
Ellen Southern (Bristol, UK)
“My work spans the mediums of voice and live performance, drawing, sound art, video and artistic direction. In the summer of 2014 I returned to Bristol after fourteen years away, and began my Site Singing project as a way to both re-engage with the region and explore my voice in new ways. In this on-going project, I venture out to conduct solo vocal experiments at a selection of English Heritage sites in the region, working directly with the acoustics to ‘vocalise’ ruined sites. The project has also manifested in the form of exhibitions, workshops and collaborations.”
Artist homepage: https://ellensouthern.co.uk
Artist FB: https://www.facebook.com/EllenSouthernVoice/
Twitter https://twitter.com/ellen_southern
Band page: https://www.facebook.com/DeadSpaceChamberMusic/
Site Singing 