Year of production: 2014 to 2015Original format: 16mm direct animation
Running time: 3 minutes 26 seconds
Screening format: 360 installation; single channel digital screening versions available
Credits: A film by Kayla Parker and Stuart Moore
Thanks: David Gilvear, Professor of River Science, Plymouth University; Mike Hooton, Kath Thomas, and Trevor Sampson, Weir Quay Boatyard; Paula Orrell, Lucy Reynolds, Phil Rushworth, and Vhari Bannister, The River Tamar Project; Tim Hardy, and Tom Cousins, University of Plymouth; Susan Austin; David Hotchkiss, Udo Hudelmaier, and Sarah Hemingway, Innovation for the Creative and Cultural Industries (ICCI), University of Plymouth; Calstock Arts
Production: Sundog Media
Commissioned by The River Tamar Project for the It’s All About the River film festival
Additional funding for 360 installation at Calstock Arts 13 and 14 September 2014 provided by an ICCI Support Fund grant
Framing the Valley 16mm film-making workshop for artists in Cornwall, at Calstock Arts 13 September, led by Kayla Parker and Stuart Moore, supported by Creative Skills
Distribution and sales: Sundog Media sundogmedia@gmail.com and Anifilm, the Czech Republic web portal Aniont
Synopsis
The river will make the film - we will be there to navigate to its completion.
The imagery is created by burying 16mm filmstrips in the mud of the banks of the Tamar, allowing the river to ‘make the film’ through the movements of its tidal waters and the action of biota - the filmstrips’ organic emulsion changed by the tides’ ebb and flow, by physical abrasion and the organisms living in the alluvial mud. Accompanied by the soundtrack developed from recordings taken from both above and below the surface of the water, the audience is immersed in the audiovisual flow of the river.
Description
The people who live along the Tamar form a close relationship with the river; each affected by the other. Artist film-makers Kayla Parker and Stuart Moore used this idea of symbiosis to create Reach. By laying raw film in the silt of the river, they have created a work which has been shaped by the river: its organic emulsion changed by the tides’ ebb and flow, by physical abrasion and the organisms living in the alluvial mud.
Reach single screen trailer from Sundog Media on Vimeo.
Retrieving the film from the mud: Salmon’s Leap, River Tamar above CalstockProduction notes
The imagery is created by burying 16mm filmstrips in the mud of the banks of the Tamar, allowing the river to ‘make the film’ through the movements of its tidal waters and the action of biota. The soundtrack developed from recordings taken from both above and below the surface of the river.
Publication and comments
"we can note a shift from an interest in the 'hardware' of film technology to a fascination with its material 'software' - the organic, porous and penetrable surfaces that offer the possibility of tactile exchange. Alia Syed's Priya (2009), for example, was created by burying individual strips of film containing images of a North Indian classical dancer in her garden in South London for varying lengths of time, allowing the biochemical breakdown of the film to become part of the image content. Similarly, in the making of Reach (2014-15), Kayla Parker and Stuart Moore submerged 16mm filmstrips in mud on the banks of the River Tamar, setting up a dialogue between the river and the film material and the tidal movements of the river that takes place largely outside the artists' own intervention." Kim Knowles (2017) 'Engaging Material Specificities: Aesthetics and Politics in 1970s' [chapter] in Laura Mulvey and Sue Clayton (eds.) Other Cinemas: Politics, Culture and Experimental Film in the 1970s. London: IB Tauris.
‘Filming the river: memories of the tidal Tamar’ [chapter/conference proceedings, with Stuart Moore] in Costa Valenta A., and Capucho R. (eds.) AVANCA | CINEMA 2016. Avanca: Edições Cine-Club de Avanca. ISBN: 978-989-96858-8-8. Publication date: 1 September 2016. pp. 140-144.
"very trippy - a bit of a mind-blow!"; "Really responded to the collaged fragments of Kayla Parker and Stuart Moore" (CMIR: ONE exhibition comments book, December 2015).
“Parker’s and Moore’s working method is a kind of close reading of their subject and an immediate interaction with it” Hidden Sounds and Histories of the River by Edith Doove, 14 September 2014, Bureau Doove.
Feature on BBC1 TV Spotlight news programme (broadcast 12 September 2014 6.30pm).
“Installation works really well; imagery and sound evocative and intriguing.”
“Great installation - wonderful making process. Love the sound of the hover fly.” Edith.
“Really enjoyed the immersive stream of the installation - really felt the nature of time and changes - causal and emotional - great piece of work.” Laura Hudson.
“A really wonderful experience. Thankyou for taking the time to explain everything to us. It was so interesting.” Eileen and Michael Stephens, Lancashire.
“Outstanding really impressive installation. Kayla and Stuart also took me for a river walk where the film was ‘made’. V. atmospheric as is the installation.”
Selection from comments book at Calstock Arts (September 2014)
Reach: 360 installation at Calstock Arts from Sundog Media on Vimeo.
Exhibition2021
ANIFILM 2021 Planet A, a special programme focusing on environment and nature. Other short animated films included in the programme: Living on the Comet, Kathy Smith; The Secrets Held in the Ice, Loic Fontimpe; Cow, Alexander Petrov; Ayers Rock Animation, Kathy Smith; A Year Along the Abandoned Road, Morten Smallerud; The natural order of things, Mathilde Poigniez; The Man Who Planted Trees, Frédéric Back. “Although (or perhaps because) planet Earth is plagued by many problems caused by us humans, it remains an inexhaustible source of inspiration, enthusiasm and awe not only for scientists of various specialisations, but for other people all around the world. And it’s this awe, or love if you will, that connects the films of this block. … Reach, using sounds heard in nature, is a pure audio-visual impression” (programme notes). Screenings: North Bohemian Museum, 22 June; Grand Hotel, Zlatý Lev, 26 June 2021. Liberec, Czech Republic.
2019
On The Surface of Things large scale outdoor film projection, Access Space, Sheffield; "exhibition of artworks that relate to our environment, either through our dependency on it, our relationship to it, our interactions with it, or our experiences of it. It is an action affiliated with Extinction Rebellion Sheffield, in response to the declaration from Sheffield City Council of a climate emergency." (Programme notes). Measure also shown, 20 September 2019)
Presentation of Reaching through time: an eco-sensitive film-making praxis, joint paper with Stuart Moore, for Imag(in)ing the Anthropocene conference; includes a screening of the film Reach; Watershed, Bristol (14 June 2019)
2018
Plein Air, the WORKERS Art and Design Studios and Gallery, Ynyshir, Wales (29 March to 2 June 2018)
'Drawing with film: gestures in time, place and memory' The Embodied Experience of Drawing Symposium, Ocean Studios, Royal William Yard, Plymouth; exhibition includes Measure and Heirloom (13 April 2018)
Cite Sight Site First Ever Artists Shorts and Environmental Humanities Screenings, hosted by Laura Denning, TV Viewing Theatre, Newton Park Campus, Bath Spa University; Inaugural programme presents short films by Hanna Tuulikki, Laura Hopes, Kayla Parker and Stuart Moore, Amy Cutler, Rob Mackay, Richard White, and Laura Denning; includes On Location (20 March 2018)
2017
Plymouth Art Weekender Compound exhibition, Royal William Yard, Plymouth; outdoor screening in sea tunnel, part of a show by Katy Richardson, Laura Hopes, Peter Chesbrough and Llyr Davies (22 September 2017)
Primordial Soup exhibition curated by Laura Denning, Cleveland Pools Georgian lido, part of the Fringe Arts Bath Festival (28 May to 11 June 2017)
Presentation of Framing the landscape: developing an eco-sensitive cinema, joint paper with Stuart Moore, for #Cinema is Dead: New Ways of Showing, Watching and Telling, the 3rd International Alphaville: Journal of Film and Screen Media Conference, University College Cork, Cork, Ireland; includes a screening of the films Reach and Maelstrom (18 and 19 May 2017)
2016
2nd Animation Marathon Romantso, Athens (30 November 2016)
Seminar, Royal College of Art, London; presented by Edwin Rostron (November 2016)
Edge of Frame programme one DIY Space for London; presented by Edwin Rostron (30 June 2016)
Athens Animfest 2016 Experimental programme 2 curated by Sarra Kassem; Romantso, Athens, Greece (11 and 12 April 2016)
CMIR: TWO - Focus on New Practice Research in the Moving Image exhibition, part of the Digital-Cultural Ecology and the Medium-Sized City conference, Arnolfini, Bristol. Maelstrom: The Return, Teign Spirit and Cinematic City also screened (1 April 2016)
The Animated Ground Meets the Film Strip LUX Cornwall, Porthmeor Studios, St Ives, Cornwall; the other films screened: What the Water Said, Nos. 1-3 (1997–98) David Gatten; Priya (2012) Alia Syed; Mothlight (1963) Stan Brakhage; Bicycle Tyre Track (2012) Vicky Smith; A Tale of Toxicology (2015) Laura Phillips (23 March 2016 7.00pm to 8.30pm)
Tricky Women international animation film festival,Transformations programme, Vienna, Austria (2 to 6 March 2016)
2015
CMIR: ONE exhibition curated by Lucietta Williams, Centrespace gallery, Bristol; Maelstrom: The Return also screened (5 to 8 December 2015, private view 6.00pm to 8.30pm Friday 4 December). Photo: Charlotte Crofts.
163 RWA Annual Open Exhibition Royal West of England Academy, Bristol (4 October to 29 November 2015)
Green Film Festival; Cornwall Film Festival, Porthmeor Studios, St Ives, Cornwall (19 September 2015)
Emergence exhibition, The Council House, Plymouth; selected by Annie Haigh (19 to 29 May 2015)
ANIFILM 06 International Festival of Animated Films International competition for non-narrative, experimental and boundary forms of animation programme, Kino Světozor, Trebon, Czech Republic (5 to 10 May 2015)
Reach was first presented as a site-specific exhibition at the opening weekend of It’s All About the River film festival in autumn 2014 as a continuous, looped 360 installation with 5 HD projectors and surround sound at Calstock Arts in Cornwall, close to the site on the banks of the River Tamar where the film was made. The 360 installation allowed the audience to be surrounded by the projected imagery and the soundscape and to move through the space, creating an experience of being completely immersed in the sights and sounds of the river itself. The film was screened also during the closing weekend of the festival at The Mayor’s Parlour, Devonport Guildhall, Mount Wise, Plymouth. After the festival, Reach was remastered as a single channel digital film with titles and credits, and released in 2015.
Tim Hardy hangs the screens for the 360 installation, at Calstock Arts