Year of release: 2004
Original format: 16mm colour negative
Running time: x 3 loops; single channel version available
Screening format: digital screening versions available (silent)
Credits: A film by Kayla Parker and Stuart Moore
Production: Sundog Media
Commissioned originally for the re-launch of Filmwaves journal at the Lux Centre, London in 2001
Distribution and sales: Sundog Media sundogmedia@gmail.com
Description
Exquisite moments held in the mind's eye, replay the feeling of being in an 'other place', transported, dislocated. Caught forever in the present, wort/wall/water looks back to a time past, and forward to the future.
Looking at the work, the viewer is aware of the hypnotic progression of images on the three screens: at times the three separate pieces can be seen, sometimes the same piece is shown in sync across all screens. The viewer becomes aware also of the gallery space itself, through the window of the world beyond, and can contemplate their own sense of place.
The first of the three pieces 'wort' reveals a shifting, flickering light across leaves of navelwort; the second piece 'wall' looks at the top of a crumbling wall, radiating the heat of the day, and beyond to the rhythmic movement of ripened grass and a glimpse of turquoise sky. In the third piece 'water', a fountain reaches the top of its jet, and tumbles back, in perpetual motion.
Production notes
The three sequences were filmed using a Beaulieu R16 camera at the end of a late summer afternoon at Mount Edgcumbe in south east Cornwall. Each 16mm sequence was looped: wort ran for 4087 frames; wall ran for 5590 frames; and water ran for 3665 frames. The left screen sequence ran wort / wall / water for 14 cycles; the centre screen sequence ran wall / water / wort for 15 loops; and the right screen sequence water / wort / wall ran 16 loops, and the entire sequence lasted 9 minutes. The DVD loops were set going in the morning before the gallery opened, and played continually until late evening: people walking past the gallery or waiting at the bus stop across the road could see the flickering light from the three screens illuminating the gallery from dusk onward.
Note: for the screening at the Lux Gallery and the exhibition at Salt Gallery we used lower case for the title of the piece: wort / wall / water.
Publication and comments
Limited edition triptych print, for saleExhibition
2014
Silence in the LIbrary exhibition, St Ives Library, St Ives, Cornwall; presented by CineStar in collaboration with no.w.here artists’ film collective, as part of Loop the Loop. Wort Wall Water shown as a 2 minute 28 second silent film, with the consecutive 3-loop sequence repeated four times (2 to 14 June 2014, Mon to Fri 9.30am to 5.00pm, Saturday 10.00am to 1.00pm)
2004
Stuart Moore and Kayla Parker exhibition at Salt Gallery, Hayle, Kernow, UK. 16mm triptych installation (playing from x 3 DVDs) on three TV monitors, each set on a white plinth in the front gallery. For our first exhibition at the Salt Gallery the three sequences from the original single screen film projected at the Lux Gallery were presented on three separate screens. The exhibition also featured the Sunset Strip lightbox, and the films Project, Night Sounding and Sunset Strip playing on a wall-mounted plasma screen. Solo exhibition with Stuart Moore (24 September to October 2004)
2001
MUTE LOOPS exhibition at Lux Gallery, London, UK. We were invited to submit a short moving image work to celebrate the relaunch of a new-look Filmwaves magazine: we made wort / wall / water as a linear film with the three elements looped sequentially, for the curated group screening of 42 artists, including Catherine Elwes, Steve Hawley, Isaac Julien, Nicky Hamlyn, Malcolm Le Grice, Michael Mazière, Christopher Meigh-Andrews, Katherine Meynall, Karen Mirza, John Smith, and Anna Thew. The programme was projected onto the Lux Gallery window, to be seen in Hoxton Square in the evening; sponsored by The Arts Council, The London Instutute, Hoax@Lux, The Lux Gallery, Luton Press, and Filmwaves Magazine (11 July 2001, 8.00pm to 10.00pm)