London Fields Session One

Photo courtesy Sally Plowman

London Fields Discussion Group enjoyed a humid first session on Saturday 27th June beneath a leaden Dalston sky. I was pleased with how the first session progressed and pleasantly surprised by the enthusiasm of the participants, since I was keen to allow the first meeting to be a fairly un-authored and informal one. Luckily everyone in the group was more than willing to talk and we got a lively discussion going about the set texts: a diplomatic way of saying they were ripped apart. Cafe OTO made for a good venue but for the migraine-inducing white-noise emitting TV monitors that were steadily set up around us, in prep for the evening's entertainment. Next time I would like to move the discussion to a quieter venue for this reason and perhaps in order to dabble in a bit of online conferencing: any Skype aficionados please stand up. An intentional componant to the first meeing were short overviews given by each participant about their background and personal research interests. It was good to see that although most had not met in person before, there were many abstract ties between the participants and lots of nice things were said about the group as platform for exchange. I also made note of people that wanted to contribute to London Fields: Inquire and agreed with the group that edition #1 would be made available on Google Docs once I have them all back. At the end of the afternoon the heavens opened and we took shelter in a pub over the road. I have decided, in light of the fact that over half of the participants travelled from outside of London, to hold the group on a bi-monthly basis in future.

In attendance: Rosemary Shirley, Pippa Koszerek, John Plowman, Alice Carey, Holly, Suzie Gwendolen, Jonathan Traynor, Jennie Syson, Nicola Streeten, Sally Plowman, Jonathan Watts, Georgina Barney and Harriet Mitchell.

We discussed:

(a) 'Art in the Rural Realm' by Matthew Lennon, Extract from Ground Up: Reconsidering Contemporary Art Practice in the Rural Context, Edited by Fiona Woods, Published by Clare County Council Arts Office, 2008, pp. 22-29. With thanks to Clare County Arts Office for donating a copy of the book to the library.

(b) 'Rumble in the Wural' by Adam Sutherland, Extract from Grizedale Arts Blog: Posted on 28/06/07 at 08:00, http://www.grizedale.org/blog/917

N.B. Notes on our reactions to these texts coming soon -please feel free to post your comments below.