Focal Point Gallery

FPG Sounds: The Owl Service, ’The Faithful Plough’

Focal Point Gallery is pleased to announce the seventh commission as part of ‘FPG Sounds’, an online project to support the development of new sound works by artists from or based in Southend-on-Sea.

For this commission, Essex-based alternative folk music collective The Owl Service have composed and recorded five new tracks, which present a contemporary exploration of traditional Essex folk songs. To mark the launch of the commission, The Owl Service will be performing 'English Country Music' at the 30^th annual Leigh Folk Festival, taking place at the Fisherman's Chapel in Leigh-on-Sea at 2.30pm on Sunday 26th June.

Since its inception in 2006, The Owl Service has worked consistently within the realm of traditional British folk song, but with varying degrees of faithfulness. In their own words, the band are 'perennial folk outsiders', always striving and struggling to find their own place and their own voice in a musical landscape that they're forever at odds with.

After reviving the collective in March 2021 after a five year hiatus, The Owl Service founder Steven Collins decided it was time to fully embrace their outsider stance with new projects that unapologetically marry traditional folk song to a decidedly non-traditional musical backing. With 'English Country Music', Collins fuses traditional folk songs collected in his native Essex with the music that has shaped him the most over the previous three decades. With the desire to explore this musical heritage, lyrics are taken from the book 'Bushes & Briars: An Anthology of Essex Folk Songs' (1979). With musical cues inextricably linked to urban life, Collins' also draws upon inspiration from his upbringing in a concrete modernist new town with no sense of tradition.

'English Country Music' includes an assemble of musicians from or based in Essex. Performed, recorded, mixed & mastered at home in Leigh-on-sea by Steven Collins with Diana Collier, Kate Waterfield, Daniel Forbes and Bryan Styles. 

English Country Music | Focal Point Gallery (fpg.org.uk)

FPG Sounds: The Owl Service, ’Newport Street’

Focal Point Gallery is pleased to announce the seventh commission as part of ‘FPG Sounds’, an online project to support the development of new sound works by artists from or based in Southend-on-Sea.

For this commission, Essex-based alternative folk music collective The Owl Service have composed and recorded five new tracks, which present a contemporary exploration of traditional Essex folk songs. To mark the launch of the commission, The Owl Service will be performing 'English Country Music' at the 30^th annual Leigh Folk Festival, taking place at the Fisherman's Chapel in Leigh-on-Sea at 2.30pm on Sunday 26th June.

Since its inception in 2006, The Owl Service has worked consistently within the realm of traditional British folk song, but with varying degrees of faithfulness. In their own words, the band are 'perennial folk outsiders', always striving and struggling to find their own place and their own voice in a musical landscape that they're forever at odds with.

After reviving the collective in March 2021 after a five year hiatus, The Owl Service founder Steven Collins decided it was time to fully embrace their outsider stance with new projects that unapologetically marry traditional folk song to a decidedly non-traditional musical backing. With 'English Country Music', Collins fuses traditional folk songs collected in his native Essex with the music that has shaped him the most over the previous three decades. With the desire to explore this musical heritage, lyrics are taken from the book 'Bushes & Briars: An Anthology of Essex Folk Songs' (1979). With musical cues inextricably linked to urban life, Collins' also draws upon inspiration from his upbringing in a concrete modernist new town with no sense of tradition.

'English Country Music' includes an assemble of musicians from or based in Essex. Performed, recorded, mixed & mastered at home in Leigh-on-sea by Steven Collins with Diana Collier, Kate Waterfield, Daniel Forbes and Bryan Styles. 

English Country Music | Focal Point Gallery (fpg.org.uk)

FPG Sounds: The Owl Service, ’The New Garden Fields’

Focal Point Gallery is pleased to announce the seventh commission as part of ‘FPG Sounds’, an online project to support the development of new sound works by artists from or based in Southend-on-Sea.

For this commission, Essex-based alternative folk music collective The Owl Service have composed and recorded five new tracks, which present a contemporary exploration of traditional Essex folk songs. To mark the launch of the commission, The Owl Service will be performing 'English Country Music' at the 30^th annual Leigh Folk Festival, taking place at the Fisherman's Chapel in Leigh-on-Sea at 2.30pm on Sunday 26th June.

Since its inception in 2006, The Owl Service has worked consistently within the realm of traditional British folk song, but with varying degrees of faithfulness. In their own words, the band are 'perennial folk outsiders', always striving and struggling to find their own place and their own voice in a musical landscape that they're forever at odds with.

After reviving the collective in March 2021 after a five year hiatus, The Owl Service founder Steven Collins decided it was time to fully embrace their outsider stance with new projects that unapologetically marry traditional folk song to a decidedly non-traditional musical backing. With 'English Country Music', Collins fuses traditional folk songs collected in his native Essex with the music that has shaped him the most over the previous three decades. With the desire to explore this musical heritage, lyrics are taken from the book 'Bushes & Briars: An Anthology of Essex Folk Songs' (1979). With musical cues inextricably linked to urban life, Collins' also draws upon inspiration from his upbringing in a concrete modernist new town with no sense of tradition.

'English Country Music' includes an assemble of musicians from or based in Essex. Performed, recorded, mixed & mastered at home in Leigh-on-sea by Steven Collins with Diana Collier, Kate Waterfield, Daniel Forbes and Bryan Styles. 

English Country Music | Focal Point Gallery (fpg.org.uk)

FPG Sounds: RikTheMost, ’Time After Tide’

Focal Point Gallery is pleased to announce the sixth commission as part of ‘FPG Sounds’, an online project to support the development of new sound works by artists from or based in Southend-on-Sea.

For this commission, Southend-born, spoken word artist, performer and producer, RikTheMost, has created a new, long-form poem, entitled 'Time After Tide', as part of a larger body of work that they are in the process of compiling, called “Heterophobia” – which focuses on the many ways fear of difference (or change) manifests, and how it affects us and our choices.

'Time After Tide' takes unlikely inspiration from Rik’s childhood ‘playground’: the Thames estuary mudflats, and shares some of the natural beauty and nostalgic joy to be found in this lesser thought of, and perhaps misunderstood, aspect of the seaside. Rik uses the mudflats, and surrounding area, as an extended metaphor to explore and compare the youthful nonchalance towards play and risk-taking found in children, with the seemingly inevitable shifts that can occur as people age, when faced with challenges and expectations that teach caution.

"Set to the ebb and flow of a minimalist soundscape of field recordings from Southend, and some further afield, there is a definite existential and introspective lean to the piece, but with a sincere encouragement for empathy and understanding.  It unpicks the nuance of growth and the complex marriage of choices we find ourselves needing to make along the way, balancing: stasis, safety, discomfort and change, as well as if we can possibly find hope under the pressure of an ever-approaching tide!" RiktheMost.

Please find an audio transcript of 'Time After Tide' here.

A list of acknowledgements for this project can also be found here. 

About the artist: 

RikTheMost (they/ them) is a vegan, queer, non-binary, polyamorous spoken word artist, who spends most of their spare time making homophobes feel uncomfortable. Born and raised in Southend, Essex, they have been commissioned by the BBC; toured internationally as a poet; represented Australia at the American National Team Slam Championships; ranked 2nd three times at the New Zealand Individual Slam Finals, been voted in as New Zealand Poetry Society’s Vice President and are currently residing and working in NZ on the prestigious “Exceptional Talent In The Arts Visa” where they run the biweekly online spoken word event and community “Your Place Events”.

Rik is also a fully qualified teacher and has facilitated workshops for individuals, organisations, and writers’ groups alike, as well as youth groups and school students from primary age all the way up to university – including La Trobe University in Australia, Plymouth University in the UK and Massey University in New Zealand.

As an artist constantly seeking understanding, RikTheMost is intrigued by the psychology of choice, emotion, motivation, interaction and reaction and how fear and the overcoming of it direct us. Their poetry is philosophical, challenging, funny (at times), emotional (at others) and, as an ex-breakdancer and keen juggler, (always) embellished with interesting rhythms and complex word play!

https://www.fpg.org.uk/exhibition/time-after-tide/

 

BBC Essex Radio Interview with Lu Williams

An interview with artist Lu Williams on BBC Essex with presenter Rob Jelly, to discuss their new public art commission for Southend-on-Sea. 

Focal Point Gallery and Creative Estuary are delighted to announce the commission of a new, major public artwork that will welcome visitors and residents to the UK’s newest City – Southend-On-Sea. Lu Williams’ impactful, ambitious, and fun concept will transform the current, uninspiring ‘gateway’ to the city’s famous High Street, as approached from Southend Victoria and Victoria Avenue.

As a seaside town, Southend-on-Sea has been a place of tourism since the early nineteenth century. In the 1970s, people also began collecting fridge magnets of Southend to remember their visit. For the public commission, they will combine these typical sea town souvenirs with the iconic imagery of the Gates of Paradise by Italian sculptor Lorenzo Ghiberti (1378-1455). Williams’ new public artwork will consist of several large scale fridge magnet sculptural reliefs based upon an extensive period of public consultations.

New Public Art Commission for Southend Town Centre | Focal Point Gallery (fpg.org.uk)

FPG Sounds: Frazer Merrick, ’Hidden Sounds of Play’

Focal Point Gallery is pleased to announce the fifth commission as part of ‘FPG Sounds’, an online project to support the development of new sound works by artists from or based in Southend-on-Sea.

For this commission, artist Frazer Merrick has created an electromagnetic soundscape of Southend, ‘The Hidden Sounds of Play’. The track is composed of electromagnetic recordings of the arcades, rides and illuminations of Southend. The carnivalesque spaces along the seaside promenade lure you in with their vibrant bright lighting displays and obnoxiously loud machines. Like a siren pulling you towards the rocks, waiting to absorb your money in return for interactive experiences and ephemeral fun.

But beneath the surface is an array of electronics making it all possible. High voltage systems powering arrays of animated LEDs and neon displays, all of which spew electromagnetic noise into the ether. Using an array of microphones that convert Electro-Magnetic Fields (EMF) into audible sound, Merrick has captured the hidden rhythms, textures and timbres of this electronic infrastructure and composed the ‘Hidden Sounds of Play’.

Electro-Magnetic Fields are a combination of invisible electric and magnetic fields of force. They are generated by natural phenomena like the Earth's magnetic field but also by human activities, mainly through the use of electricity.

Credits:

Composition and field recordings - Frazer Merrick

Drums - Ben Hunt

Frazer Merrick is a sound artist who uses electromagnetic field recording, circuit bending and instrument building to create carnivalesque sonic experiences. Frazer's work is curious, interactive, and collaborative. He has performed a gig underwater for Essex Book Festival, recorded an award-winning binaural soundscape of Walton pier for BBC Radio 3, and was selected as one of Sound and Music’s New Voices for 2020. Frazer is currently developing the Photon Smasher, a range of instruments which turn light into sound.

Hidden Sounds of Play | Focal Point Gallery (fpg.org.uk)

Jessica Ashman, ’You Are The Underworld’

In response to Jessica Ashman's moving image commission 'Utopia Portals', artists Beverley Bennett, Khaleb Brooks and Richard Phoenix have collaborated with Ashman to create a soundscape that reacts to the themes, emotions and energy presented in the work. The artists worked in a 'call and response' way, recording elements of music and poetry, sending them to each other and responding accordingly. This compliments the method that Ashman used to make 'Utopia Portals', which was created from an amalgamation of field recordings, mobile phone footage and animation filmed during her time visiting her ancestral motherland of Jamaica for the first time. 

Credits:

Production: Jessica Ashman and Richard Phoenix
Guitar, vocals and sound design: Jessica Ashman
Spoken Word: Beverley Bennett and Khaleb Brooks
Bass and drums: Richard Phoenix
Steel Pan: Beverley Bennett

Jessica Ashman is a London based artist working in animation moving image, music, performance and installation. Her work focusses on creating experimental narratives that explore gender, identity and race. Her work draws on the wider stories of the Black British diaspora communities she was raised in, especially the histories and oral testimonies that have been lost or hidden in these communities. Science-fiction narratives and the meta-physical theories these narratives present are also influences on Jessica’s practice, especially when it comes to world-building within her moving image work.

 

FPG Sounds: Josephine Melville, ’Lost in Music’

Focal Point Gallery is pleased to announce the fourth commission as part of ‘FPG Sounds’, an online project to support the development of new sound works by artists from or based in Southend-on-Sea.

For this commission, writer and director Josephine Melville has created a new sound work in the form of an experimental mixed tape. Combining a series of musical extracts with spoken word, ‘Lost in Music’ explores a cultural and personal history of vinyl. Written and performed by Melville, the work describes the transformative nature of music with its ability to transcend time, connecting us to powerful thoughts, feelings, or memories. In doing so, Melville also traces her personal experience of the development of sound and broadcast technology; from the Ekco Radio Bakelite to the Amstrad Stereo Record Tower. With interludes of music selected by the artist, ‘Lost in Music’ explores the ‘indelible print’ that music leaves on your mind.  Mixed by Bradley Charles.

Please see here for the audio transcript. 

Josephine Melville is a Creative Practitioner based in Southend-on-Sea.  Her varied career began as a dancer, making her transition to actress, writer, director, archivist and producer, working in Theatre, TV, Radio and Film for over 40 years. She is one of the co-founders of The BiBi Crew who wrote, produced and created their own comedy material; a co-founder of Aarawak Moon Productions and co-founder of Eye 2 Eye Promotions specialising in creating interactive workshops for educational and corporate organisations. Eye 2 Eye has an archival unit which houses the award-winning Posters and Poetry Exhibition which focuses on the last 100 years of Black British contribution to the arts. Melville is also Founder of the South Essex African Caribbean Association (SEACA), creating initiatives, projects and events to break down cultural barriers enhancing community cohesion, while helping to build, promote and share African and Caribbean Culture in Essex.

Lost in Music | Focal Point Gallery (fpg.org.uk)

FPG Sounds: M G Boulter, ’Clifftown Sounds’

Focal Point Gallery is pleased to announce the third commission as part of ‘FPG Sounds’, an online project to support the development of new sound works by artists from or based in Southend-on-Sea.

For this commission, musician and songwriter M G Boulter has created a special episode of his podcast series ‘The Clifftown Podcast’, which was initiated during lockdown to explore the micro-histories, culture, and people of Southend-on-Sea. Conducting interviews and field recordings, Boulter describes becoming hyper-sensitive to the sounds around him in the absence of ambient traffic, aeroplanes and children playing outside. Embracing this new auditory landscape, ‘The Clifftown Podcast’ emerged to discover both hidden histories and sounds alike.  

For his contribution to Focal Point Gallery’s experimental sound programme, Boulter presents ‘Clifftown Sounds’, a new sound piece which merges field recordings of Southend life with musical interludes performed by the artist and collaborators. In doing so, the work creates a shared sound space of natural and humans sounds, described by Boulter as “a veritable rainforest of suburban wavelengths”.

Credits: 

M G Boulter - Guitars and Lap Steel

Helen Bell - Violin

Harriet Bradshaw - Cello

Additional technical assistance and production - Andy Bell

M G Boulter is a musician and songwriter who aside from releasing his own work has collaborated with a number of UK and US acts in the folk, roots and Americana genre. His storytelling style of song writing explores the suburban experience, as well as coastal communities. In April 2021 he released ‘Clifftown’, a themed album about growing up in the seaside town of Southend-on-Sea. This was accompanied by a companion project ’The Clifftown Podcast', which saw M G create a podcast series exploring the micro histories, culture and people of the Southend area.

Clifftown Sounds | Focal Point Gallery (fpg.org.uk)

In Conversation: Becky Beasley and Abigail Jouanides

Becky Beasley and Abigail Jouanides discuss the politics and histories of printed matter, the power of small individual private gestures, self identification through clothing, queering and boundary spaces intertwined with neurodivergent perspectives.