Figures in Stanley Park. Visual Media (Single-channel, single-screen 10’25” HD video)
- Submitting institution
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University of Wales Trinity Saint David / Prifysgol Cymru Y Drindod Dewi Sant
- Unit of assessment
- 32 - Art and Design: History, Practice and Theory
- Output identifier
- 32-TD2
- Type
- Q - Digital or visual media
- Publisher
- Vancouver Biennale, Canada
- Month
- -
- Year
- 2016
- URL
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https://www.vancouverbiennale.com/artworks/figures-in-stanley-park/
- Supplementary information
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- Request cross-referral to
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- Output has been delayed by COVID-19
- No
- COVID-19 affected output statement
- -
- Forensic science
- No
- Criminology
- No
- Interdisciplinary
- No
- Number of additional authors
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- Research group(s)
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- Proposed double-weighted
- No
- Reserve for an output with double weighting
- No
- Additional information
- In 2015, as an invited artist-in-residence for the Vancouver Biennale in Canada, Davies explored the social, cultural, political and physical meanings of particular sites. The resultant output, Figures in Stanley Park, investigates the social relations of site at Stanley Park, a public park on the edge of the Vancouver which is the location of the last First Nations residents of Vancouver, who were displaced from the area in the 1920s. The research process involved library-based and primary research into historical and contemporary Vancouver, in terms of its political, cultural and social contexts. The particular focus was how to make a site-responsive artwork for the biennale that incorporated and elicited contemplation of the park’s history and brought wider awareness of the former role of the site to a broader audience through community participation. Several video sketches emerged following visits to locations during the residency. This suited the biennale’s theme ‘Open Borders/Crossroads’, and provided a critical discourse on the economic and social disadvantages experienced by aboriginal people in Canada. These themes were witnessed and explored during visits to the city of Vancouver’s Eastside neighbourhood during the residency. The research process culminated in a performative video which incorporated ideas from John Cage’s 4’33”. Vancouver residents volunteered to be filmed for the artwork. They were filmed entering a woodland area in the park, with the ambient sounds, both from nature and man-made, providing a naturalistic backdrop to the choreographed movement of the figures which explores themes about: humanity and its environment; what informs and creates that environment; how a particular environment is experienced, constructed and can be deconstructed through visual art. Dissemination: Premiered at an outdoor cinema event in Stanley Park in 2016.
- Author contribution statement
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- Non-English
- No
- English abstract
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