The Militarised Countryside: A Journey to Imber, Salisbury Plain’s Ghost Village
LOCATION: Wiltshire WORDS: Gareth E. Rees It’s a long road to Little Imber, Salisbury plain’s ghost village. The MOD have opened it for public access, as they do occasionally at Easter and Christmas. Turning off the A360 from Tilshead, the
Baleen
WORDS: Gary Budden LOCATION: Kent There was all the stuff you’d expect; heart lungs liver kidneys etc. Baleen thick and numerous like bristles on an old paint-brush. But nothing in the gut, half-digested and smelling of pricey French perfume. Empty
An Exploration of St Peter’s, Cardross
LOCATION: The Firth of Clyde, Scotland This is an extract from Angus Farquhar’s photo essay in the new book St Peter’s, Cardross I set up NVA, an independent arts company (the letters stand for nacionale vita-activa, meaning ‘the right to
Magic & Mystery in the Mundane – An Exploration of Uncanny Places
WORDS & PICTURES: Gareth E. Rees This is an edited Transcript of the talk I gave at the Hastings Storytelling Festival, Wednesday 9th November 2016. I want to tell you a story. It’s about how an erotic encounter with an
Uncanny Landscapes: From Pylon Love & Mad Benches to Car Park Epiphanies
WORDS: Gareth E. Rees EVENT: Uncanny Landscapes at The Hastings Storytelling Festival, November 9th, 7pm, Havelock Road, Hastings (FREE) I’ve been kindly invited to speak at this year’s Hastings Storytelling Festival. Because it’s a festival of storytelling, I am going to
The North London Museum of Native American Culture: A Southeastern Rail Shaggy Dog Story
LOCATION: Southeastern Rail, London, Hastings WORDS: Ben Thompson The first time I saw Tex (and although at that point I didn’t know his name, it would probably have been one of my first guesses) was at about eleven o’clock on
The Fate of England’s ‘Infant Hercules’
A review of Stripped Tees: Endurance and Hope in the North East by Richard Milward and Natalie Hardwick [Influx Press, 2016] LOCATION: Teesside REVIEWER: Laura Harker “This remarkable place, the youngest child of England’s enterprise, is an infant, but if
Outer Space Travel In Manchester’s Makro
LOCATION: Manchester WORDS: Gareth E. Rees I only remember Makro because of its car park, the space outside the place. The interior of Manchester’s warehouse cash ‘n’ carry store was forbidden to children under twelve, so my parents would leave
Pier Pressure: Matchbook etiquette and Dizzee Rascal’s Birthday Cake
LOCATION: Hastings, East Sussex WORDS: Ben Thompson Piers are by definition irrational structures – temporary institutions, neither sea, nor land, living on borrowed time until the inevitable conflagration. But then, which of us hasn’t felt that way at one time
The Cornish Lost Kingdom & The Oil Spill: A Catastrophic Soundscape
LOCATION: Cornwall ALBUM: Kemper Norton, ‘Toll’ LABEL: Front and Follow WORDS: Gareth E. Rees Kemper Norton’s new concept album brings together the lost Cornish kingdom of Lyonesse and a 1967 oil tanker disaster that occurred in the same stretch of
