Monthly Archives: February 2014

Unknown Importance

Posted on by
Reply

‘Work emerges from a particular place, it engages intensively with the history and politics of that place, and with the resonance of these into the present’ (McAuley, 2007, p.9) in (Pearson, 2010, p. 10)

Last week as a group we were given the opportunity to visit the Lincolnshire Archives with the intention to gather more historic information about the Grandstand which would allow us to further our knowledge of the site and offer us inspiration for our performance work.

After independent research of the Grandstand through online sources, I felt that I knew a fair amount about our site but when getting to the archives and looking around at the documents that were placed on the tables for us; it was quite clear that there were many aspects of the Grandstand’s history I had no knowledge of at all. The room was full of documents, maps and artefacts from newspaper articles and prints to blueprints and old pictures, revealing this site’s past life which was highly fascinating to look through and explore.

IMG_2553 IMG_2551 IMG_2552

Even though I found the whole experience extremely worthwhile and inspiring, my particular interest was researching more about the Latin/foreign phrases that can be seen on some of the architecture and artistic work within the Grandstand. With help from Adrien, one of the professionals that worked in the Archive, our visit allowed me to explore the meaning and relevance of these phrases towards the site in a lot more detail.

I was able to find out that ‘Per Ardua ad Astra’ which is the phrase featured in the war memorial in one of the rooms translates as ‘through adversity to the stars’. I then went on to discover this was and still is the motto of the Royal Air Force as well as the other Commonwealth air forces and the Royal Flying Corps connecting to the theme of War that radiates from the site. The other phrase I wanted to know more about was ‘Dieu et mon droit’ from what we know now as the royal coat of arms of the United Kingdom situated on the roof of the Grandstand. I discovered that this was a French medieval phrase which translated as ‘God and my right’ which Adrien informed me is the motto of the British Monarch in England. After discovering the translations, I learnt that the building was built as a part of Queen Victoria’s Jubilee celebrations which allowed me to make further connections. Now the building wasn’t just linked with the theme of War but also the Monarchy which gave me a unique viewpoint of our site and realisation of the potential this theme has for creating performances.

To echo some of the other posts, we talk all the time about how the site has lost it’s effect/importance on the community and I think we know how much history the building has to show but sometimes we feel the need to ignore this to try and find something ‘out of the box’ to motivate us. The fact is the building has so much character and historical background that it would be ridiculous to not allow ourselves to be inspired. In relation to this I think the Grandstand holds a lot of potential for us to create contemporary ‘performances’ from historic events and topics that we can use after visiting the Archives.

References

McAuley, G. (2007) ‘Local Acts: Site-Specific Performance Practice, Introduction’ in About Performance in Pearson, M (2010) Site Specific Performance. London: Palgrave Macmillian.

Looking back at History

Posted on by
Reply

So visiting the Archives today we got to see the Grandstands true history, the old, the war, and what they wanted to turn it into. I never knew they wanted to turn the grandstand into a mortuary and seeing the blue prints from it, it was quite new and refreshing. I wouldn’t personally turn it into one and i’m glad they didn’t, it basically represents coming into Lincoln and it’s city. On the outside to people passing in cars they get to see this old, historical building with horses and the old race field opposite the stands.

Going to the Archives opened up a wider knowlegde of how the grandstand was used and who went to the grandstand ( King James 1 in 1617, George 1 in 1716).

The main history we know is the horse racing but through researching online I found out this out;
“The course introduced jump racing in 1843, though it never really established itself as a regular attraction. Indeed, the future of racing at Lincoln had fallen into doubt when the bookies took a hand and helped to secure its name in racing history through the Lincoln Handicap.” IanS (2012) Lost racecourse 6 – Lincoln and the Lincolnshire Handicap. [online advertisment] Available from http://www.geegeez.co.uk/lost-racecourse-6-lincoln-and-the-lincolnshire-handicap/ [Assessed on 13.02.13]
Which I found quiet interesting because no one ever speaks about how they brought in jump races even though it was popular and it was stop it is still history and something that happened. We also came across a newspaper clipping that mentioned the races A.Orme who won on his horse Bees Gorse, it mentioned he won by three lenghts against Taj-Ga. Which inspired me to look into people or there horses who have won at the Grandstand. I came across this article online which mentioned the Lincolnshire Handicap winners between 1926 and 1937 which were;
· 1926: King of Clubs
· 1927: Priory Park
· 1928: Dark Warrior
· 1929: Elton
· 1930: Leonidas
· 1931: Knight Error
· 1932: Jerome Fandor
· 1933: Dorigen
· 1934: Play On
· 1935: Flamenco
· 1936: Over Coat
· 1937: Marmaduke Jinks
(IanS, 2012)

Charlie and I then spent our time looking into the old betting cards which were displayed on the table. We liked the fact they showed each jockey’s weight and the horses age. It also said in small writing that the third race of the day the jockeys weight had to be over 7st but in the fifth and sixth face it had to be over 8st 12lb. We found out the jockeys were weighed about 3 weeks before each race event. We also found out the times of the second to last race which were;
1st race – 1:50pm with 28 racing (five furlongs)
2nd race – 2:20pm 26 racing (six furlongs)
3rd race – 2:50pm 22 racing (one mile)
4th race – 3:15pm 16 racing (two miles)
5th race – 3:45pm 20 racing (five furlongs)
6th race – 4:15pm 35 racing (one and a half miles)
Looking through the betting books the times were nearly always the same and if not only ten minutes difference. The miles was always the same every year until the races ended.
Once I can upload my photos I will provide more information on today and it’s history.

 

The Space and The Body

Posted on by
Reply

Usually objects and people will have to conform to the space available to them but last Friday we had to take it to a whole new level. Using the inspiration of Will Dorner’s Bodies in Urban Spaces, that our tutor showed us in our seminar, we set out to find hidden spaces and put them on show by forming our bodies to the spaces around the grandstand.

    20140207_091920[1]

In the picture above two performers took up the space inside a small tree to show both the potential of the space in which the tree takes up and also the fact that it is not noticed due to its location. It is situated by a metal fence, which people walk through,  to get from the golf course to the car park.

20140207_092405[1]

Another picture we captured was the one above which shows three performers using their bodies to fill the space of an old metal turnstile. This created a layer effect which we then decided to use in our next task; which was to re-create a shape we made outside in a space inside the grandstand. We choose to use a space which consisted of a small area with lots of stacked chairs. The use of chairs worked to our advantage to help reproduce the layers of the shape, we previously made, through changing the height of the chairs.

Our last task was to create a piece from the spaces we had used inside the building. We made our piece to focus on a lively place becoming an abandoned place. we wanted to depict a place going from being popular to not being noticed. It was, however, interpreted differently by our tutor who felt it was almost like a destruction had occurred and we were then piecing it back together. Our tutor felt it linked back to the idea that the grandstand was considered to be a possible mortuary in World War II. This was something we didn’t consider and then when it was pointed out to us we realised that it could be seen as that. We then instead ran with that idea and decided to take our shoes off and dot them around the floor by the chairs. We then, as performers, had to retrieve our shoes. One of our group members also suggested that the 3 performers that were stacking the chairs could try and form shapes on each others spaces until they ended up in the space they should be in. In running with the mortuary theme, this could have been seen as soldiers putting their lives back together (putting shoes on and stacking the chairs), then trying to find their way home (forming shapes in the wrong spaces) and then finally finding their way home (the shape that is formed at the end).

Work Cited

  • Will Dorner (2008) Bodies in Urban Spaces, USA

 

No present without the past.

Posted on by
Reply

After reading The Handbook To Drifting (extracts) (Smith, 2010) I tried to look at the Grandstand in a new way.  My intention was to forget about the sentiment and memory contained in the site and look at it with the point of view that if I wasn’t part of the Grandstand’s past, why should I hold it so dear when trying to feel a response from the site.  The third instruction in this ‘guidebook’ was to use your senses, to “walk slowly and look for meaning in everything.”

When you explore the exterior of the Grandstand it is more achievable to think about what you can see and how your senses are engaging in terms of the present,  however when you explore the interior there is one particular spot where you can’t really forget the past.

The RAF emblem over a fireplace in one of the main rooms leaves very little else in your mind when trying to place the grandstand in terms of its meaning.  The meaning that you find here is that the grandstand played a part in the war and assisted the Royal Air Force in the Lincolnshire area.  You can understand the difficulty I might have in trying not to think about the past.

P1020804

Another instruction in the guide to drifting particularly interested me and that was number 22: “When you encounter strangers, LISTEN to them.” I think it would be very interesting to go out and ask people what their opinions on the grandstand are and yet this would also counteract my new found ideal of not dwelling in the past.  I think what I’m trying to say is that people can not form an opinion of the grandstand if they don’t know what it is, or where it is, or if they’ve never seen a picture of it.  In order for them to express their feelings they have to know it, and this inevitably means knowing about its past.

I like to think that my attempted ‘drift’ in which I had an aim (not sure that’s exactly the point) failed to a point that I now understand more than ever that without the past we literally wouldn’t have a thing, therefore why on earth should I try and make any of that past irrelevant?

Works Cited:
Smith, P. 2010. Mythogeography. Axminster, Devon: Triarchy Press.

The Claustrophobic Corridor…

Posted on by
Reply

grandstanc

“Seek those public places that are ‘hidden in plain sight’ and  visited by very few people”.

The Grandstand to me is a place of history. A site that has many stories to be told yet there is no longer anyone to tell them. Now a rundown community centre, the once beautiful grandstand is no longer that. The cold rooms and dusty tables show us that although the site is still used it is not well maintained and looked after. However, it has so much potential when it comes to finding a ‘performance’ space. From the large open spaces to the claustrophobic corridors there are many places that could be used within our site specific ‘performances’.

For our group in week one, we fell in love with a corridor at the back of the Grandstand. This corridor was part of the building that had been slightly maintained to its original condition. The antique style tiles and the detail in the brick work seemed authentic to the original building and gave us lots of inspiration about creating a piece of work that showed the origins of the site.

The corridor contained large windows which seemed to frame the outdoor space. The windows overlooked onto the back of the Grandstand and then beyond that the Grandstand could be seen. In some ways it could be described as an “unintended theatre”, creating a performance space out of what is already there.

This space is definitely one that we will have to consider for our final ‘performance’. The coldness of the small corridor against the openness of the golf course creates a great dynamic which I would love to explore further.