Philip Gross in ‘Outposted’ map project
Idea for collaborative work based on ordinance survey maps came about ‘in the surreal first two weeks of lockdown’.
The Quaker poet Philip Gross has contributed to a map project exploring the mysterious sense of place.
The former TS Eliot Prize winner is just one of many creatives who has annotated and decorated local maps in a bid to create ‘a chain of response to current circumstances; pandemic, isolation, or contented solitude,’ according to its creators.
The initiative – named The Outposted Project – was started by Stroud artists Susie Hetherington and JLM Morton when they posted an Ordnance Survey map of their native Stroud Valley to a selection of twenty-eight local artists, designers, poets, writers and musicians.
Each contributor creates and pins work to the map, or works directly onto it, before posting it on to a new participant.
The idea came about ‘in the surreal first two weeks of lockdown’, says the website, with the two artists ‘reeling from the impact of school closures, self-employment angst, and the shock of being separated from loved ones… not to mention the globally shared fear of the virus itself’.
Since then the project has grown to include other areas: The Brecon Beacons, Brighton & Hove, and South London. The creators said they hoped to have an exhibition of the results.
Philip Gross shared a picture of the map he has contributed to on social media, including art by Valerie Coffin Price.
He tweeted: ‘A glimpse of Valerie Coffin Price’s elegant and eloquent “setting” of my poem adding a point of personal memory and value to a map of the Brecon Beacons, as part of the ambitious wide-ranging Outposted project.’
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