PRESS

2020 Call to Holy Ground, Kindred Spirit Magazine

2018 BREADROCK review, Cherry Smyth, Art Monthly April
2018 BREADROCK at PEER Hoxton, Caroline Douglas, director of Contemporary Arts Society

2018 BREADROCK review Tanya Harrod Crafts Magazine September

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TESTIMONIALS

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"Yoruk was an experience in my life like no other I had previously encountered. It was a time of deep medicine, inner alchemical transformation, and a connection to ancient wisdom. The creative growth of inner self has already seeped into my artistic practice and has supported me in a truly difficult time in my personal life. I am so grateful for everything that took place there. My senses still recall all that surrounded me – the smell of incense and fire in the night air, the sweet taste of figs in the morning, the sounds of women chanting and laughing together, and the sight of eagles soaring above us as we reached the mountain top. I left feeling like I had not only witnessed a beautiful creative act unfold, but that I had been an artwork myself – arriving as a raw material, worked on and transformed by the land, the processes, the magic of that time." - Nomadic residency participant

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"Wow Wow Wow! Was an expression that I heard several times during my nomadic residency journey ‘Eye of the Wind’ and it really sums up exactly how I felt about the September gathering at Mount of Oaks, Portugal. I have experience in women’s circling and yoga practice, in permaculture, foraging and fooding cultures within intentional communities and in creative art practice but I have never experienced a residency which combined these elements in such rich, and delicate layers as this one. The food which was prepared by a group of dedicated herbalists, chefs and spiritual journey makers was seasonal, experimental, traditional, organic, vegetarian and vegan (upon request), and plentiful. Each daily menu was sympathetically considered in full appreciation of the day’s activities and the week’s unfolding, and the joy with which we shared our meals a table was very special. The Mount of Oaks community land is based on permaculture principals and was a vibrant addition to our ‘work' and the perfect stage for deep inner reflection and transformative magical processes. Eva and Isik held the residency beautifully and intelligently, and the unfolding was perfectly timed; gradual, energetic and profound. All the participants were practicing artists and sympathetic to alternative modes of being in the world even if many were new to the different approaches which were incorporated into the schedule. Thank you everyone for such a deeply positive experience." - Nomadic residency participant

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"I was struck by how carefully considered every word and action was on the yoruk. There seemed to be so much effort and care put into everything, it flowed so seamlessly and really felt like slipping into a magical realm. The ritual spaces and circles that were held stirred some kind of ancient memory inside me - Thank you. The oscillation between extremely profound and extremely playful moments was a wonder to experience and a great lesson for life! "

-Nomadic residency participant 

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“I was greatly impressed by BREADROCK at PEER. Fourthland carried out a rich and remarkable long term collaboration with the culturally diverse communities of the Wenlock Barn estate and the resulting exhibition is testament to this. Both the film and the sculptural installation are also impressively original artworks in their own right. The many strands of shared making, knowledge and ritualistic activities which unfolded over this ten year period resulted in the creation of powerful visceral objects in a multitude of media which have now been transformed into magical pieces of sculpture. Similarly, the 16mm film is much more than a document of an exceptional community project. It pays tribute to a place and its people with a poetic richness and texture that is utterly captivating and one of a kind.” – Louisa Buck
 

“So transportational – like being taken into a different world”
– visitor to BearMotherHouse
 

“Warm, fetus, not wanting to leave, wanting to lay down, wanting to meet these women. Hands, Images of many hands in the room”
– visitor to BearMotherHouse
 

“Working with Fourthland through objects and shared making has really shifted the way we deliver our sessions. The group is now much more empowered to bring their knowledge into everything that we do”
– Xenia project leader 
 

“I was besieged and astounded when I first encountered ‘I feel like doing this’, the bold and unexpected film that Fourthland and Rosalind Fowler made with the Wenlock Barn Estate residents. I was left grasping for allegories, analogies, figurative speech and metaphor, anything that would accommodate the affective assemblage experience I was unsuspectingly plunged into. During ‘Permissible Notations Of’, the residents became inventors of their own cultural assemblages, keepers of the keys to their own museum, custodians of their own makeshift heritage. This is an exceptional example of creative collaboration”
– Prof. Alberto Duman, lecturer in Fine Art and Social Practice, Middlesex University
 

“I am so deeply thankful for everything you made possible and shared in these days! You gave me the tools to own my own spiritual practice. It felt like being part of a circle of precious stones that every day moved a little closer, vibrated and shone a bit more and formed a common necklace towards the end. I am very grateful for your immense generosity to share your tools and processes of creation and inspirations with us without holding back. Your role shifted between mother/teacher and child in a beautiful way. Everyone of us had space to shift and transform, settle or dance in their own space and space rather than being assigned a fixed role. It feels like the beginning of a journey towards a freedom of spirit and body that has just started. I want more!”
-Nomadic residency participant
 

“So much gratitude for the circle and the space you created for such a beautiful, expansive and humbling journey. Rediscovering the ancient and elemental forces of the creative process felt like remembering part of me long lost… feeling like our time birthed a story in me that grows day by day from collective roots. Still feeling the presence of the circle and our dance and voice still gentle sings through my being. Thank you for bring us together and for sharing so much.. would love to join on future journeys!”
-Nomadic residency participant
 

“It was such a multi-sensory and multi-layered experience that I am finding it hard to put words around it. Just a few of the sensations – the soft light of the early morning sun, incense, bells, soles on the earth clay floor, hot soil, red paint on feet, the last apricots and luscious figs, our chanting, wild flowers, music, tears, sitting on the sticks and dry leaves of the forest, holding new hands, cool water, red thread, olive oil, fresh herbs, wet felt against wet hands, unfurling paper, speaking, laughing, my baby turning in my belly, tiredness… The whole experience was so suffused with these sensations, an overwhelming richness in every moment. It could be enough just to be still to taste it all. And overlaid on the sensations, a richness of emotional connection, both within and with others. You brought us together as a group so skillfully, so gracefully, so powerfully. I felt a wonderful safety in the holding space you created. I constantly felt in the presence of your generosity – the ceremonies you created for us, the material and objects you brought, the practices you shared with us, the structure you suggested. I can’t think of anything I would not have wanted to experience, in order to create that possible space. I could see the retreat as a seed of something that then continues to grow in exchange with others. Finally, I felt an enormous privilege being among the group as the one’with child’ and also one of the older presences. It helped me to see where I have come in my own journey, and to feel the next steps emerging in front of me. Overall it was a wonderfully rich, grounding and loving time, and I came back carrying a lot of peace and happiness.Thank you.”
-Nomadic residency participant

"I opened up my flat on the estate this summer to record the sound for the film. My neighbours came round and we improvised sounds using stuff I had round the house and my neighbour’s old Casio keyboard. It was a playful couple of afternoons. Since then, I’ve met up with my neighbour to talk about music and he’s giving me advice on things to listen to for my own singing. In this sense, the project helped to create flashes of insight into the potential that’s all around. It also makes me aware of how low the expectations are that we normally have, and brings hope that we can escape these expectations of ourselves and other people. Living here, you come across a certain amount of daily anxiety and weariness in people’s lives. It can weigh down people who have a lot to contend with, almost without really noticing that that mood has taken over. The project opened these blocks out in a whole new way" -Permissible Notations of participant

 

“You do such beautiful things. We’re all so trapped in a very difficult non-human space, that your work opens our hearts and spirits… even just thinking about it does that, spreading a different perspective, giving hope and calm…” – Dr. Julian Manley, Researcher Psychosocial Unit, Lancashire University
 

“I entered your other world, or rather the world that feels hidden. I spent a deeply satisfying time wrapping myself with the spirit you weave. I loved the mysterious and yet oddly familiar objects. To me your exhibition feels like a museum of objects from a strange yet familiar culture that we should not loose our connection with.”
– Exhibition visitor

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“It was a moment to let the surface go, allow it to attend to itself for a while, and to pay attention to the foundations, the roots and the body. It also reminded me that taking time can be a process of making time; the doing of the slow, embodied action can open up space and time that didn’t exist before.
– Exhibition and conference participant

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“It was truly a beautiful and contemplative exhibit.  I think it is this contemplative aspect that I found most powerful. We might need to take urgent action but we do not need to act urgently”.
– Exhibition visitor
 

“Intelligent, elegant, insightful and deeply moving”
– Conference participant
 

“a place of ancient, deep-bones knowledge and groundedness that is also actively engaged with what is happening right now”.
Philippa Bayley Workshop participant, Cabot Institute
 

“Ambitious and surprising”
– Exhibition visitor, back to where we have not quite been, Arnolfini 

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“I honestly feel like I’m seeing the world in a completely different way.  Thank you so much for coming down and engaging us with your art and your way of thinking.”
– Workshop participant, Cabot Institute

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“To encounter silence, sensory led explorations and deep and thoughtful reflections was a pleasure."
– Exhibition visitor
 

“You created spaces where listening to each other was a priority and you did it in a very natural way, no one had to tell each other to listen, it just happened.”
– Project participant
 

“I have learnt more from this process than I could have ever imagined”
– Project participant
 

“Your workshop was a gift of surprise. I loved every moment of the week I spent with you. I enjoyed the new way I could experience my peers, interact physically and emotionally. Share ideas, play with both our voices, space, textures and feelings of light, shadows of seeing and doing things. You gave me something that left a beautiful after taste, the art of union. What a great ritual art can be when it represents principals of humanity. Union, communicating, dancing soulfully and innocently. This work of recreating and uniting us to this basic principal of existence. What are we if we don’t interact with our others with openness?”
– Workshop participant, Bergen Academy of Arts
 

“One of the few projects that have truly delivered cross generational, cross gender, cross ethnicity, cross ablebodied and not; it has enabled neighbours on one of the most troubled areas on a troubled estate to get to know each other and develop a sense of community, succeeding to become part of the fabric of the estate.”
– Anna Eagar, Director of Housing and Urban Regeneration Shoreditch Trust
 

“Fourthland’s sharp metaphorical gaze sheds light on a multitude of hidden subjects”
– Journalist and workshop participant, The Storm

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“Words are useless in such occasions, I felt very loved and supported and still carry the circle with me. It was all like a dream to me our time together and I can’t stop talking and thinking about it. Thank you again for everything you gave us so much of your love and your life force.” – Residency participant, The Song of the Cave
 

“Our time together nourished me so deeply, it planted so many seeds for my life journey, for the expansion of myself in the world. I came with the clear intention of being held, but I didn’t know what that looked like or felt like. I came with a veil on, not knowing what I was to see, but was met with the most beautiful humans I’ve ever met who held me and nurtured me in ways I never knew I could be open to. You have all changed me and held me, and I will carry the sacred journey with me everyday. I will carry the bravery it takes to open and be held, and the empathy it takes to hold, and create a nurturing space for myself and for everyone who is apart of my life path. Thank you for the gifts, I am honored to have shared this experience with you and learn from your ancient wisdom." – Residency participant, The Song of the Cave