Who are we and what do we want to achieve?
We are two artists based in Brighton, UK making an ambitious piece of work about the Shetland Isles landscape using ceramics and sound. It's an unusual combination of materials and we're really excited by the work that we've done so far.
Kay Aplin is an established architectural ceramicist making large scale installations for the public realm for over 20 years.
Joseph Young is a sound and performance artist, whose work has been performed and exhibited at Tate Modern, Tate Britain and the Estorick Collection in London.
Our aim is to create a collaborative exhibition which explores the experience of being immersed in a landscape, rather than gazing at it (in the manner of a landscape painting). We will do this by combining our talents to create a series of large-scale ceramic relief panels and a four channel sound installation, creating a space for quiet contemplation.
How you can help us...
Apart from that initial grant for research, we have been funding this entire project ourselves, but in order for us to see this through we need your help. Making ceramics is a time and labour-intensive process (as is sound editing) and we will be working 7 days a week until we go to Shetland at the beginning of April to install the exhibition. We believe that this show, once people get to see it and hear it, will be worth the effort.
We have the backing of a number of key organisations including Shetland Arts, Shetland Museum, the University of Brighton, Phoenix Brighton (where we both have our studios), plus Artists Open Houses, 51 Zero and Brighton Digital Festival who are all keen to see this project succeed. They are supporting the work in-kind through the loan of their facilities, equipment, staff and venues, as well as their marketing expertise, but the economy of the arts is such, that that is all they are able to give.
Your support will pay for all the making costs of producing such a large body of work; our travel and accommodation in Shetland; shipping of the work back to Brighton and a catalogue to accompany the exhibition in September.
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The catalogue will include a specially produced CD edition of the sound installation, with the help of Portuguese sound art label Green Field Recordings. We are looking forward to working with graphic designer David O'Connor on this and additionally we will need to commission critical texts from professional curators and pay a photographer to document the work as it progresses. This kind of documentation is vital for us in promoting our work in the future, as well as being a permanent record of the project.
Rewards
In return, we are offering some fabulous rewards, including mounted ceramic panels from Kay's Botanical Structures series, new ceramic limited editions made especially for In A Shetland Landscape (the Shetland Series), 3D audio sound collections for listening on your mobile device, field recording workshops in the Sussex countryside and overnight trips to see the exhibition and stay in the sumptuous loft room at The Ceramic House. We hope that these will entice you to support the project in whatever way you can...
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Finally...
If we exceed our target for fund-raising then we will be able to buy a new 4 channel sound system for the gallery space at The Ceramic House, enabling visitors to listen to the exhibition in the highest possible quality. The sound system will then become a permanent resource for future exhibitions and help us to realise our ambition for making The Ceramic House a home for innovative ceramic and sound art exhibitions.
Please support this unusual project - ideally by pledging cash, but if that's not possible then you can use the sharing tools on Indiegogo to get the word out to as many people as possible.
PS If you have any questions about the rewards or the project itself please contact us here and we will respond as quickly as possible. (The gallery section has more pictures of the project and the "perks")
Kay and Joseph xx
