In the background, Timespan director Sadie Young records the audio.
In the background, Timespan director Sadie Young records the audio.
Field Journal
Day 1
Arriving at Helmsdale at 14h30, I was met by the Timespan’s curator Sadie Young outside, who told me “Sean is waiting for you to go and start digging, is that ok?”
[At Helmsdale, everything happens very quickly].
Sean, a professional builder and stone mason, was sitting in a van outside. Upon greeting, he showed me the tools and the wooden frame he had prepared, for which I had sent last-minute instructions two nights before.
I also met for the first time archaeologist Jacquie Aitken, whom had suggested in an email that I should be digging a “peaty-podzoil”, in a site not too far from the village. Jacquie joined us in a field excursion, to point where this site was, and along the way, I realised that the history of this site intersected with many of my own research interests. An archaeologist by training, Jacquie is also a permanent collaborator at Timespan, and her encyclopaedic knowledge of the landscape revealed essential for my experiment.
I made a quick sketch to communicate the procedure, and explained to Sean and Jacquie that a slope would make the digging easier, since we needed to excavate 1.5 meters, to be able to describe the three soil horizons. We walked a couple of yards from the van, into the shallow peatland, and picked a spot on a gentle slope, facing the ocean. [following FAO’s manual, “the site should face the sun, etc ]
[At Helmsdale, everything happens very quickly].
Sean, a professional builder and stone mason, was sitting in a van outside. Upon greeting, he showed me the tools and the wooden frame he had prepared, for which I had sent last-minute instructions two nights before.
I also met for the first time archaeologist Jacquie Aitken, whom had suggested in an email that I should be digging a “peaty-podzoil”, in a site not too far from the village. Jacquie joined us in a field excursion, to point where this site was, and along the way, I realised that the history of this site intersected with many of my own research interests. An archaeologist by training, Jacquie is also a permanent collaborator at Timespan, and her encyclopaedic knowledge of the landscape revealed essential for my experiment.
I made a quick sketch to communicate the procedure, and explained to Sean and Jacquie that a slope would make the digging easier, since we needed to excavate 1.5 meters, to be able to describe the three soil horizons. We walked a couple of yards from the van, into the shallow peatland, and picked a spot on a gentle slope, facing the ocean. [following FAO’s manual, “the site should face the sun, etc ]
I had no idea how hard it would be to extract the sample.
After a few first shovels of soft peaty organic soil [ layer composed of litter, organic matter ] the next layer emerged, and it contained a high number of solid aggregates, rocks with different sizes and dimensions, which were not possible to dig without more tools. Sean left to pick up some stone cutting tools, and left me alone for twenty minutes at the site.
A stone mason, I thought, I am really lucky. I had suggested to Sadie over email that “I could do all the digging, just needed a couple of spades” my naivety was soon broken by the hard rocks, and Sean ended up doing most of the digging, stone breaking, and stone cutting, with the help of an electric rotor saw. The whole process was extremely violent.
I started digging and trying to get as much out of our hole as I could before Sean would return. It was becoming night very fast, and we had only an hour left before the site would be totally dark.
As I stood there on my own, contemplating the moor landscape, gently flowing down to the sea, the digging was not a priority. At that point I had no idea if we would be able to complete the sample, but I realised also that the process was more than digging. I wanted to hear again Jacquie explain the clearances, this time on site, over the material recorded in the extracted soil profile.
After a few first shovels of soft peaty organic soil [ layer composed of litter, organic matter ] the next layer emerged, and it contained a high number of solid aggregates, rocks with different sizes and dimensions, which were not possible to dig without more tools. Sean left to pick up some stone cutting tools, and left me alone for twenty minutes at the site.
A stone mason, I thought, I am really lucky. I had suggested to Sadie over email that “I could do all the digging, just needed a couple of spades” my naivety was soon broken by the hard rocks, and Sean ended up doing most of the digging, stone breaking, and stone cutting, with the help of an electric rotor saw. The whole process was extremely violent.
I started digging and trying to get as much out of our hole as I could before Sean would return. It was becoming night very fast, and we had only an hour left before the site would be totally dark.
As I stood there on my own, contemplating the moor landscape, gently flowing down to the sea, the digging was not a priority. At that point I had no idea if we would be able to complete the sample, but I realised also that the process was more than digging. I wanted to hear again Jacquie explain the clearances, this time on site, over the material recorded in the extracted soil profile.
When Sean returned, it was clear that I would not be able to do much of the digging, we worked for another half an hour until night fell. Last efforts with a mobile phone torch light. Before leaving, we measured how much we had achieved in those two hours. We went down almost 1,20m, which meant that we only needed 30cm more to have a full exposed profile. Sean was keeping the hope alive, and promised to join me the following day to complete the task. The only thing is that this needed to happen before the group would leave at 9h45. we calculated at least another hour for digging, and under less than an hour to extract the sample. Sean drove me down, and we agreed to meet at 7h30 outside of the hotel.
We headed back to the village for the first performance readings and lectures [the whole programme was very intense and interesting]
I was lined up to give a lecture on the second day, as part of a long road trip across several sites with a long political history. I suggested to Sadie instead that I wanted to do my field lecture at the site of the sample, and if possible, I wanted to record Jacquie’s knowledge of that site.
We headed back to the village for the first performance readings and lectures [the whole programme was very intense and interesting]
I was lined up to give a lecture on the second day, as part of a long road trip across several sites with a long political history. I suggested to Sadie instead that I wanted to do my field lecture at the site of the sample, and if possible, I wanted to record Jacquie’s knowledge of that site.
Field Journal
Day 2
As the alarm rang, I could hear the heavy rain falling. Outside the windows, total darkness. I had the feeling this was not going to be an easy task. I wondered if Sean would be waiting for me outside, but there he was in the van, headlights on, illuminating the rain drops. As I got into the van, he confessed that he hoped I would not show up also... in any case, he proposed to drive up to the site, and wait to see if the rain settles.
When we got there, it took only a few minutes for the skies to clear. And for the first time I contemplated the absolute beautiful land, with a strong red colour shining with the top layer of the peat.
As we got to our site, the hole was of course, half-full of water... [did not follow instructions on page 4. cover your pit...] Sean at that point had brought a portable radio loudspeaker with him, “to keep us motivated” he said.
As he jumped inside to start and collect the water to clear the pit, the news were discussing the first day of the United Kingdom outside of the EU.
When we got there, it took only a few minutes for the skies to clear. And for the first time I contemplated the absolute beautiful land, with a strong red colour shining with the top layer of the peat.
As we got to our site, the hole was of course, half-full of water... [did not follow instructions on page 4. cover your pit...] Sean at that point had brought a portable radio loudspeaker with him, “to keep us motivated” he said.
As he jumped inside to start and collect the water to clear the pit, the news were discussing the first day of the United Kingdom outside of the EU.
The last effort was harder than the previous day. We had reached the iron layer, and the percentage of stones was now the majority. The pick echoed in the air, sparkles flied, and a smell of burnt metal hitting the stone. That’s when the saw came out.
As time was running against us, and the water kept filling the bottom of the pit, we decided to remove the representative sections in parts, avoiding the operation of inserting the frame vertical in the pit, which in any case, we were not entirely sure we would be able to remove on our own. [this proved right the following day, as to carry the sample back to Helmsdale took the effort of 4 people] So we ended up composing the profile in parts. At that point, I was just happy to be filling the box with representative soils from each horizon. But during this process, Sean was extremely attentive to the procedure. He removed a few different cores, paying attention to preserve the structure of each section.
We finished the profile, covered it to protect from rain, and left back to Helmsdale.
As time was running against us, and the water kept filling the bottom of the pit, we decided to remove the representative sections in parts, avoiding the operation of inserting the frame vertical in the pit, which in any case, we were not entirely sure we would be able to remove on our own. [this proved right the following day, as to carry the sample back to Helmsdale took the effort of 4 people] So we ended up composing the profile in parts. At that point, I was just happy to be filling the box with representative soils from each horizon. But during this process, Sean was extremely attentive to the procedure. He removed a few different cores, paying attention to preserve the structure of each section.
We finished the profile, covered it to protect from rain, and left back to Helmsdale.
That day out with the group was very intensive, as we spend most of the time inside the vans driving, listening to what the curators of the exhibition described as incantations, sound pieces composed for the exhibition. Including Margarida’s contribution, which sounded as we approached a nuclear site near the seaside.
At a beach where I was supposed to have delivered my field lecture initially, we had a short introduction to the project of the sample. And while discussing with Jacquie on the role of soil technoscience in the politics of land, in particular population expulsions, we realised that the history of the clearances had a strong resemblance with the population displacements. We agreed that this would form part of the discussion the day after.
At a beach where I was supposed to have delivered my field lecture initially, we had a short introduction to the project of the sample. And while discussing with Jacquie on the role of soil technoscience in the politics of land, in particular population expulsions, we realised that the history of the clearances had a strong resemblance with the population displacements. We agreed that this would form part of the discussion the day after.
Field Journal
Day 3
Without much time left, the last effort was to bring the sample back to the museum, and also to collect representative soil samples, one from each of the three horizons. Since time was running against us, I took these last samples while Jaqui gave a talk on the colonial history of the Highland Clearances. At that point, the sample was the material around which we could assemble.