Introduction:
Eccentricity is widely regarded as a slowly diminishing behavioural trait in today’s society, compressed and pressured to conform to popular consensus of normality. Yet looking closely throughout our England and Lincolnshire pockets of eccentric behaviour are still rife.
The Trivia of Eccentric England explored through a series of new commissioned projects and accompanying talks and films, the nature and role eccentricity plays in today’s modern lifestyle, and asking what role an artist can have in reviving and reinventing English eccentricity in Lincolnshire. A film programme looked at past examples and explored in wider sense societies eccentric behaviours, which teeter on the edge of popular conformity.
Programme:
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Henry Hemming
Talk on his book 'In Search Of The English Eccentric'
Henry Hemming spoke of his journey to find the quintessential English eccentric and the origin of eccentricity it’s self; by revealing information about the stories that developed the book and the people that shaped it. Henry put forward his thoughts to dispel the secrets about eccentricity and the philosophy behind it, questioning whether eccentricity is still alive and relevant in contemporary society.
Courtesy of Luke Fowler and LUX,
London
Luke Fowler
Film: Bogman Palmjaguar, 2007 (30mins)
Bogman Palmjaguar is a portrait of a man who after a series of disturbing events became distrustful of people and withdrew into nature. Bogman describes himself as 'the hidden cat' and 'wild outlaw of paradise' and is fighting against a diagnosis that brands him as a 'paranoid schizophrenic'
Bogman had been passionate about the threatened habitat of Scotland's Flow Country; a wilderness made of blanket bogs and peatlands that houses a unique diversity of wildlife. However the peatlands also became a hide-out, when Bogman fled attempts to section him. The film is a reconciliation of the young conservationist with his older self; isolated and withdrawn from society.
Courtesy of Shezad Dawood and LUX, London
Shezad Dawood
Film: Feature, 2007-2008 (55mins)
Feature does not directly hold a single narrative, instead opting to explore the notions of cinema. The film deliriously swings between cinematic genres, whereby the cowboy from a classic American western morphs seamlessly into the zombie of a 90’s style horror and all of this set with Cambridge as a backdrop. Dawood mixes historically recognisable characters and those stereotyped by popular culture in order to blur the boundaries that film has set as fact or fiction, taunting Hollywood iconography.
Uddin and Elsey.JPG)
stop look listen, Uddin and Elsey, photographer James E Smith
23rd May - 1st June 2011
stop look listen
Lincoln Central Railway Station
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stop look listen, Uddin and Elsey, photographer James E Smith
Drawing upon public fascination with railways and their histories, Uddin and Elsey used the public spaces within Lincoln Central Railway Station to develop a series of visual and sound interventions. The works ranged from train spotting videos and games in the waiting rooms, to sound installations of the Lincolnshire Beevor band. The works stemmed from historical references to British railways and the romanticism intertwined with them stemming from their inauguration during the industrial revolution.
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stop look listen, Uddin and Elsey, photographer James E Smith
Interested in how the railway station acted as a key connection point in the city’s landscape acting as point of arrival and departure Uddin and Elsey encouraged the audience to ponder how the station is used as a place of social interaction, and how people function in these spaces as they go about their busy lives. Often using the station as a no mans ground, a piece of land connecting two places with limited engagement with the space its self, the artists attempted to interfere with the balance and expectation of the stations familiar sites.
The interventions remained within the train station for a period of ten days where audience members could activate and engage with many of the pieces that interacted with the usual station environment.
Anthony Schrag.JPG)
Parade of Normal Things, Anthony Schrag, photographer James E Smith
Thursday 23rd June 2011
Parade of Normal Things
A part of the Lincolnshire Show
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Parade of Normal Things, Anthony Schrag, photographer James E Smith
What is normal!? Can anyone be truly normal!? Anthony Schrag set out to question just this through an open competition in the local newspaper, to try and find the most normal person in Lincolnshire and, through a parade of normal objects at the annual Lincolnshire Show, a quintessentially ‘normal’ part of the calendar for Lincoln.
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Parade of Normal Things, Anthony Schrag, photographer James E Smith
The newspaper campaign to find the most normal person in Lincolnshire sparked the interest of local Lincolnshire dwellers with young, old, man and dog participating in the competition. The competition was judged by Anthony Schrag and Henry Hemming the author of In Search Of The English Eccentric, who deemed it necessary to have a king and queen of normality, subsequently Ellen and Roy were selected and crowned at the Lincolnshire Show.
Anthony began his search for normality by locating local groups that typified Lincolnshire; the groups included the local table tennis club, the chess club, and a historic windmill society amongst others. The groups then donated objects that were representative of normal activity within the group, but when isolated appeared at odds with the environment. The final objects included a selection of dummy cheeses, a certificate from a patron of the city and a poem, with a total of eleven objects, which were then taken to the Lincolnshire Show.
At the Lincolnshire Show the parade of normal objects took place where by a group of Lincolnshire Yellowbellies toured the objects around the showground at scheduled times, whilst asking the audience to select their most normal object. Questioning the very essence of their normality as they sit together in a slightly ridiculous but humorous manner that illustrated what is normal to some, might be considered eccentric to someone else.
The day concluded with the crowning of the king and queen and the honouring of the most normal objects, which by nomination of the public vote and king and queen were awarded to the dummy cheeses and a book donated by the local reading group.