Dan Powell, von Haus aus Fotograf und seit Jahren auch in den Bereichen Installation und Field Recordings aktiv, dokumentiert in seinem neuen Tape den subsistenzwirtschaftlich orientierten Betrieb der Old Chapel Farm in Wales. Ausgangsmaterial waren eine Vielzahl von Objekten, die in verschiedenen haptischen Bearbeitungen zu Klingen gebracht wurden, zudem die geräusche der umgebenden Natur und Musikinstrumente, die sich im besitz der Bewohner befinden. “Four Walks at Old Chapel” ersheint Mitte Mai bei Crónica.
“Old Chapel Farm is an adventure in living which aims to bring people closer to the fundamentals of human existence: the creation of food and of shelter. It is a bridge reaching forwards into a newer, more sustainable way of being in a rapidly changing and highly populated world. As a family we have been visiting this place every year since 2011. In 2017 I decided to produce a piece about Old Chapel Farm as part of my series which focuses on personal experience of a space. On our trip in 2018 my daughter Bea and I collected objects we found around the site and gathered them together in a straw bale
hut suspended over a stream in a wooded valley which the farm’s owners made available for us to use. We recorded small performances with them, brushing, scraping and rubbing them to produce a wide range of intimate sounds. We also made field recordings around the site, including using a piano which had been exposed to the elements for some time. Back in the studio in Brighton, I arranged the recorded sounds into a new work. I wanted to try and communicate some of the mystery and revelation I’ve experienced on my visits, and the connections I feel with the land and people I encounter when I visit the farm.” (Dan Powell)