First Friday Walk October 2020

Serendipity and Walking in to the Unknown

The brief took into account the current state of affairs with the COVID restrictions and followed our previous FFW practices of synchronising our walks to enable us to walk together, but alone.

'Walking from somewhere you’ve not been to previously' - The Brief: Be ready to make your own map of your progress and include as many reference points as you can….be innovative

Your map can be as large or as small as you wish and can be of any format

As you walk, be aware of sounds, smells colours and shapes - you may chose to include these in your map.

From your starting point, turn right (unless you find your self in a cul de sac, then turn left)

Walk exactly 10 minutes

Stop and find an object to examine - this can be anything you can pick up: a plant, a stone, a brick, some rubbish - etc.

Examine it, draw and photograph it. Write exactly 30 words on it’s appearance and history (real or imagined)

Walk until you can take a left turn - follow that path, track or road for exactly15 minutes.

Stop and find an object that you can’t pick up

Examine it, draw and photograph it. Write exactly 50 words on it’s history (real or imagined)

When you’ve completed your activity, walk until your path, track or road branches and take a right turning.

Walk that for 1000 paces (there are plenty of pedometer apps for Android and OS phones or devices. Alternatively, just count

Stop and look down

Examine what you see, draw and photograph it. Write exactly 70 words on it’s appearance and history (real or imagined)

Walk to where ever your finishing point may be.

On the way, stop for 5 minutes and reflect on where you’ve been, what you’ve seen, heard, smelt, touched and perhaps even tasted. Add some of these observations to your map.

Our Participants

Jenny Staff

I just drove my car out of Brighton until the allotted time, and stopped in Clayton, Hassocks, at New Way Lane - that seemed so full of synchronicity that the whole process was very easy. I walked the lane following the directions and made a folded map to protect it from the weather.

On return to the studio I then made one of my walking drawings in response to the walk - retracing the number of steps that I had taken on the walk inscribing half of them in pencil and the other half in white pencil drawn simultaneously. the coming and the going.

mental and physical.

It was inspiring and also a bit frightening to move out of my regular lock down walk - and made me realise that mentally I had been locking down too. This is a pivotal moment in my life and courage is called for and this walk moved me forward into the unknown - and it was magical, beautiful, solitary, scary and challenging. I felt refreshed and enlivened.

David Tidsall

Walking at Naphill Common, Buckinghamshire

Kel Portman

Walked to unknown places from Edgeworth in Gloucestershire and where he became overwhelmed by woodland

Richard Keating

Keith Munro

Written reflections;

First section – An old mussel shell, empty. Would guess that it was recently washed up, no idea who or what ate it. Nice place to eat it, doesn’t smell of garlic though…

Second section – A big hunk of sea rock jutting out into the water where the Firth of Forth bleeds into the North Sea. My rock knowledge escapes me… the rock is scarred into many small sections battered by the sea. Watching the waves crash and splash gives a minute glimpse of process.

Third section – What looks like a freshly washed up bit of seaweed. It is one of the smaller pieces in amongst about a dozen on the same patch of beach. The tide appears to be coming in now, so although it looks soggy and freshly washed up, it must have been here since the last tide. This may be lunar, it was a full moon, or close, last night, placing it here.