Flow Blog

Over 25mm of rain fell over the weekend and helped to fill all the vertical pipes fed by the largest group of funnels. So the water is now moving into the horizontal pipes on the surface of the pond. 

Hoorah  …good rainfall has at last set the rain harvester working almost daily  and the rain water caught in the funnels is now moving down hill channeled through the flexible pipes and into the sequences of vertical tubes. 

Some nights up-to 11mm of rain fell.

Week beginning 5^th August Serious production began to make 90 rain catcher units. Four different sizes of plastic funnels where used to make 6 different unit designs, one of which was later ditched.

Each size of funnel had a slightly different fixing system, dictated by the weight of the funnel and the position they would be in on the slope around the pond, i.e. how high the grass was.

The 22cm funnels being the heaviest are set onto rigid plastic nozzles, which when installed sit low to the ground.

The medium sized funnels were fixed onto irrigation spikes, elevating the units approximately 50cm above ground, i.e. above the grasses.

The smaller 7cm funnels provided me with the most light weight & flexible units enabling me to make more delicate and flexible units low to the ground.

Week beginning 12^th August

Friends Judy & Pat arrived from the U.S for a holiday and after a day recovering from jet lag; they quickly got sucked into the production line along with Holly & Bryony.

We spent days cutting copious lengths of micro piping, connecting the piping to the funnels, fixing valves to the piping and sealing funnels to bases. With friends to help the production line soon became less stressful and more enjoyable with much laughter & music care of Pats guitar playing. Thank you.

Week beginning 19^th August

Installation: many issues predictably arose

How to make the larger dimension pipe stay in the surface of the water?

How to install the vertical pipe elements when the pond is too deep to safely wade out?

How to get the funnels to level up when the ground is uneven and stony?

At this stage the planning on paper is left behind and it’s down to trial & error, patience and as much help from friends as possible.

Week beginning 26^th August

Relays of more boat people paddled me out to continue to install the hoop system to hold the pipe up above the surface of the pond and install the vertical tubes. High winds nearly everyday making timing and padding important so we didn’t knock over what we had already installed.

Leveling & more leveling of funnels continued…….

Week beginning the 1^st of September

Early on the 1^st September I set about checking that the system worked. Throughout the opening day I gradually poured 50 litres of rainwater into the funnels to start the flow off, as we had had no rain in the last 4 days. Gradually I began opening the valves to let the water flow down the piping to test the system……. Water & gravity combining to make the installation come to life.

Ironically after the wettest summer in decades the rain has stopped falling, just as ‘rain harvester’ is ready to capture and funnel the precipitation along my network of piping. So for now the sequences of vertical reservoir tubes wait to be filled, but I am confident they will be soon!

Week beginning the 9^th September

High daytime temperatures and no rain so far, the result being the initial water in the funnels has flowed into the first few vertical tubes and the remaining water has evaporated leaving crystallized water dye in the funnels were the valves were left open. One line of funnels had the valves closed so they have retained some water.

In the early hours of the 14^th of September 1mm of rain fell, not enough yet to fill the funnels……

Here we are at the end of the opening day chilling with a few bottles of red, having not written on the blog for 3 weeks now.
Spent most of that time in leaking waders, wetsuits or boats making art & being blown off course in howling gales… do we exaggerate?!
The opening was great with 200 or so visitors viewing the works in blustery, wild, sunny, rainyness….
Looks good.
Comments good.
Visitors local and international.
Job’s a goodun.

Just about to head back down to the ponds after a few days away from the art coal face! A couple of weeks ago I spent a really valuable few days experimenting with materials, making a silicon mould and casting hundreds of tiny wax houses. A good day was also spent towing clumps of weed around / attacking Julia’s trees (thankfully under the guidance of an ex-forester). Both allowed a clear view right up the long pond on which I’m working.
Was great to find that when the houses are suspended above the surface of the water, you can see a carpet of red from the other end of the pond. Not sure how the changing water levels will sit with my piece, but that’s one of the challenges of a new, outdoor environment… Also thought the next door farmers were about to bury the railway hut in a mound of plastic-wrapped hay, but all is well…!

I have decided to use this opportunity to ‘blog’ as a way of recording the process of making & installing ‘rain harvester’ and to record the way in which the three different elements of the work catch and channel the water into the reservoir tubes set within my pond.

With the concept and design thought through months ago I am now in the throws of collecting materials and tools needed around me, searching for missing items, testing out construction ideas & methods and making endless lists in a bid to avoid the inevitable tendency to panic with only 3 weeks to the opening, even with 20yrs experience!

Today was my first chance to launch three of my grass islands on the pond. I
knew they’d float because I’d tested them at home but I hadn’t realise how
deep the water was. This made positioning the islands rather frightening,
the mud was sucking at my waders and made movement difficult. I hadn’t
appreciated the density of the water-weed which also impeded the movement of
both myself and the islands. I’m wondering how this lack of movement will
effect the drawings I make because the process of mark-making will be linked
with the movement of the islands. Maybe things will become clearer when I
launch all fifteen islands on the pond.

Hello my name is Cynthia Morrison-Bell, the curator of the Flow exhibition. This time last summer, I sat down with the artists and we discussed the idea of an exhibition set on this series of freshwater ponds.  It has taken a whole year to get this exhibition funded and organised, but at last we’re getting ready to install the work…   Full of trepidation, anticipation and excitement we’re going to start putting some of the work on the water….Will the artworks sink and disappear? Will they float and do what the artists want them to do?!

I’m having a major issue with bubblewrap, can I really use it to depict cyanobacterial mats? I’ve been stuffing the bubbles with shredded blue/green plastic bags and sometimes I feel the scale and effect is just right - and using recycled materials is good - other times I find myself thinking: plastic floating on ponds…. not good.