My performance piece, ‘Procession’, is a version of a
station of the pilgrimage of Craogh Patrick. It was acted out in a field near my home for the PilgrimChat
pilgrim CHAT 2021 – movement
(chat-arch.org) and here November
14 – pilgrim CHAT 2021 (chat-arch.org) after completely a journey to the
holy mountain in County Mayo in Ireland in October 2021. The pilgrim has to circle St Patrick’s bed seven times, on their knees. In my version of this I drew whilst doing the station. I recorded the whole
journey showcased at PilgrimCHAT, from my home in Scotland to the top of the mountain in live drawing whilst travelling
via car, ferry and foot. It was a necessary journey to draw a line or punctuate
the time we have been living through. With the Covid-19 Pandemic, the lockdowns
and the Brexit vote and all the uncertainty these brought, we made a choice to
return to Europe via the sruth na Maoile (the North Channel) and seek
punctuation for these times by climbing the mountain, to be able to move
forward to better times. If I am successful in my submission my performance of ‘Procession’
which is approximately five minutes long and could be repeated. I draw the
process every time I circle the ‘bed’ seven times. It would be accompanied by a
short film and also a series of (wall-based) framed drawings, made in response to the pilgrimage and upon the journey. I hope the performative piece, performed in part, at the end of this iMovie short, highlights the act of pilgrimage going back into the anthropocene. Craogh Patrick has been a place of pilgrimage for millennia. I circle the bed seven times in the full piece, drawing all of the time. 'Procession' the performance came from this experience and creative practice.
