To work within an idea – a boundary – that is both invisible and with no real physical presence, be it for the odd sign or millstone, can be worked with through its absence, how it disrupts and affects change though its imposition within the landscape: economic land values, people’s lived experience, navigation, to name a few.
“Now, imagine this walk. It is one thousand metres in length, beginning at a ford, across a stone bridge and over a brook, ending at a wooden bridge where the water gathers pace and runs down into a valley. 360 metres above sea level and it is covered in bilberries. Lie down, instead, on the bridge and watch the aeroplanes arrow-straight descent, before beginning your slower and more scattered descent towards Manchester.”
Extract from ‘One Thousand Metres’ by artist Alison Lloyd.
“What will be left of all this? When our walks are over? Our conversations stop? When the lens of our cameras replaced? The photosensitive chemicals rinsed away? We slip our phones into our pockets? We unlace our boots? We return home? When we close our tabs and put our laptops to sleep? What will we have to show for it? Not that it matters, of course. What matters is that we did it. We did it. But we didn’t only do it for ourselves. How, then, to share it with others? With others not present? Or present from afar. Or present in the future. Because something changed. Something changed, and it matters. We think it matters but don’t wholly know why, don’t wholly know how.”
Extract from a new text for the book ‘When our walks are over’ by writer & artist Lizzie Lloyd.