DRAWING OUT THE CANAL

DRAWING OUT THE CANAL PROJECT is focused around a 10-day walking, drawing, talking residency along the entire 87-mile length of the Kennet and Avon Canal, from the center of Reading to Hanham Lock (Bristol). The project will initiate and exchange collaborative story-telling through drawing and engaging with histories along the towpaths. DRAWING OUT THE CANAL PROJECT will engage with a variety of local groups and clubs from Trowbridge along the 6-day route through activating the process of collecting graphite rubbings, as a way of engaging with the canal histories and generating layers of narrative around the locale. At drawing Projects UK, I will then examine the generated variety of rubbings, developing an immersive as well as smaller, intimate artworks from the ‘textures of history’ in relation to the 6-day walk. Drawing as a way of transporting to a place, it’s memory and the experiences surrounding it. The amassed rubbings will then be interpreted in a number of ways, over the period of 4-days, in relation to the geography, history and narrative of the whole canal route, alongside exploring the spaces of Drawing Projects UK. I will be walking the Kennet and Avon Canal, collecting rubbings and wild camping if anybody wants to join me between 8 August and 11 August! I will then be resident between 11 August and 16 August at Drawing Projects UK preparing work for an exhibition there in October. I am also fundraising for the The Pituitary Foundation (UK), the brain tumour I had removed last year. Support the foundation through my DRAWING OUT THE CANAL Project at: https://www.justgiving.com/fundraising/SimonWoolham