Broken Sticks of Rock, an installation at the Pie Factory, Margate

The title for this exhibition came from memories I gathered from a show at Limbo, Margate in 2010.

Participants were invited to write down a memory about Margate. When collated a common thread emerged of people identying with specific places in Margate: Dreamland, shops, food, the beaches and particular  streets. The memories were fond and formed an impression of a subtly different Margate, different but not unrecognisable from the present.

In response I set about walking the streets, taking photos and collecting ephemera from the places of their memories. When it came to assembling my collections ready to exhibit I didn’t want to use anything expensive because the memories were unpretentious and I wanted to respect that. Whilst seeking a solution I found some lampshade frames in a charity shop, I kept looking until I had 10. I then explored ways of attaching the items I had collected to the structure of these frames.

The resulting forms I called urchins. They could be either street or sea urchins and they display the trash or treasure I found on the streets and shorelines. They were lit from underneath, mounted on cable drums and exhibited in a darkened room with intermittent dry ice.

They have a jewel like quality and present the viewer with notions regarding value. How can the discarded be of value? I was thrilled to see children respond to them in a really positive way.

memory 1
it has to be the scenic railway- time & time again,
cueing up and racing to get the back seat!
cramming 3 of us in, wedged tight & hanging on,
screaming our heads off.

memory 2
moving my Grandmother around the sundeck as the sun moved across the sky.

memory 3
broken sticks of rock on the journey home