International Women’s Day: MA Art and Science’s report on their artist residency in Spain
- Written byJuliet Williams
- Published date 07 March 2024
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Juliet Williams (MA Art and Science, Central Saint Martins) recently took part in an artist residency opportunity offered to her cohort at Joya: AiR in Spain. The trip was organised by Dr. Heather Barnett, Pathway Leader MA Art and Science, Co-Director of Living Systems Lab, and Simon Beckmann, curator and co-founder of Joya:AiR, and supported by a LVMH Maison/0 Challenge Fund. The group of ten women sent on the residency were able to celebrate Women in Science Day during their trip. Here, Juliet reports back on their experiences and discoveries.
I was part of a group of ten women from MA Art and Science fortunate enough to travel to Joya: AiR, Andalusia, Spain, for a ten day art and ecological residency which appositely coincided with Women in Science Day.
Situated in a restored farmhouse 1000m above sea level and subsistence farmed for generations, the land was abandoned 50 years ago. Since then the modest but effective traditional techniques to irrigate the land via terracing, channelling the water evenly across the land and holding it in small reservoirs have fallen into desuetude.
We as a group went to help with a phase of the restoration of these strategies entitled “Holding Rain in the Headwater”.
The idea is that, by interrupting the rush of water from high up the mountain and allowing it to sink into the ground, the fertility of the land will be improved and the erosion caused by the Gota Fria – the catastrophic flash floods which occur periodically in this region – will be reduced. The force of these torrents sweeps soil, trees, roads, livestock and people down the mountain, gathering momentum as it travels with devasting consequences. As the Gota Fria reaches the coast it washes chemicals used in the thriving agricultural industry into the sea causing algae blooms and the concomitant imbalance of the ecosystem. Previously, a once in twenty year event, the last seventeen years have seen five.
The water’s strength is visible in the barranco; a deep crevice carved through the limestone by the pure power of the water during Gotas Frias. Trees cling to the steep sides for dear life, limestone hunks cleave and slip, dusty soil precipitously waits to slide and stone dykes and defences have been torn asunder.
Each morning we hiked through the terraces of blossoming almond trees to the level where Aleppo pines grow. Here some large-scale excavations had been made to flatten and deepen an area to act as a water catchment area. Our task was to plug the gaps and bolster the protective dykes of earth and the gullies around the area.
We blocked these gullies with branches and natural debris, trampled them down to take the energy out of the moving water lessening its destructive forcefulness and enabling it to seep into the ground. This would better irrigate the land, preventing soil erosion, leaching of nutrients and playing a small part in preventing the surge of water which becomes the Gota Fria.
We planted with native species. The compacted ground was hard to dig. An individual terrace had to be created for each plant and filled with the goat manure. Some stone walling was employed. Pine needles and flat rocks gathered to place around each plant to prevent evaporation. Finally watering done from huge canisters in a place which has had no decent rainfall since last May.
For me, working the land was an intrinsic way of understanding the landscape and its challenges. My hands in the earth meant I felt the dusty texture of the denuded soil, understood how easily the harsh wind whipped the soil off the land and a deluge could wash it away. Digging meant I battled with the stony, rock hard ground. Planting allowed me to appreciate the delicate yet tenacious filagree of roots that would bind the soil together, appreciate nature’s ingenious designs to enable a holm oak or the wiry rosemary to survive drought. I felt the back breaking weight of the precious water needed to ensure these plants’ survival.
The work made me understand just how hard it is to work such land; to grow anything in this sun dazzled, arid, windy landscape. Let alone cultivate a crop of almonds or basics to provide for a family.
The other way I made sense of the landscape, its history and present problems was sketching. Initially, I drew whatever I found: stones, bones, leaves, twigs. Then each evening I was drawn to the warmth of the kitchen where an olive wood fire stoked the range amidst a collection of odds and ends; old cooking pots, olive jars, sticks for shaking down the almonds, esparto grass bands for making Manchego cheese. And I drew them. Gradually understanding that these basic utensils had been vital to the survival of the farmers and were made from the land; the very clay had with great effort made every tile on the roof, the cocidos in which to cook, the hoya (the vast bowl whose shape names the area of the residency).
As I flew back over the vast blanket of white polytunnels that covers the area surrounding Almeria for agriculture, I pondered how hard gained these simple kitchen commodities were and yet how lightly their makers had trodden on the earth.
Our experiences and outcomes from Holding Rain in the Headwater will be shared at Central Saint Martins on the afternoon/evening of Friday 19 April to coincide with Earth Day activities. Check the MA Art and Science Instagram page for more details.
Related Links
- Follow Juliet on Instagram
- Discover more from the residency via MA Art and Science's Instagram
- Find out more about Joya: AiR
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