Artist-in-Residence - Christine Mills
"People have always communicated through music, with the help of materials and life on the land - such as the miles of dead cows guts that string a harp, the tails of horses that help create the voices of our orchestras. Boundaries have been pushed and skills developed in the manufacture of instruments that not only create sounds that express our inner feelings, or communicate our concerns about nature, but visually celebrate the land with the instruments themselves."
"I am interested in a contemporary take on all of this, to have an opportunity to explore, investigate and move on in my journey. I need to be up to date in how I communicate the relevant issues that arise from this investigation and this is my task for my ongoing project, Tinkering With Strings, generously supported by the Arts Council of Wales' Creative Wales Award since 2015. The award has allowed me to undertake background research, providing me with an opportunity to investigate the fusion of these two abstract languages, sound and visual, experimenting in an intuitive way between music and material culture."
"To begin a new phase of this investigation, I was fortunate enough to spend a week in June 2016 at West Dean College, part of the Edward James Foundation, the first of a series of visits to be supported by the College's Artist-in-Residence programme. I spent time with the students and tutors on the Making of Stringed Musical Instruments programme, part of the School of Creative Arts, watching the viol makers and being a fly on the wall... it was all fantastic stuff! They were bridge making... connecting, helping me connect, communicate, contact... I am moving on... and return to West Dean for another few weeks in October!"Christine MillsBorn and brought up in Montgomeryshire, Christine lives just a few miles away now on a hill farm with her family in Llanerfyl. The land where she lives has inspired her creative work and the media from which she creates her work is simply dictated by her ideas rooted here, from film to installation work, drawing with sheep's fleece to rolling felt and much more. She went to Central School of Art and Design, Goldsmiths College, University College London. She has exhibited in Wales, China, Ireland and Washington and has work in many public collections. For many years, Christine has been undertaking projects as an artist in residence, including a period at the Centre for Alternative Technology as part of their fortieth year anniversary celebrations.
