Emma Yorke

A large scale, site specific weave-based piece installed and de-installed on 24th May 2022 in the Temple at the top of the formal garden at Dartington Hall as part of my MA Arts & Place residency.

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'Sanctuary' (2.5x15m) is an embodiment of a graph showing the decline of three types of British bird populations between 1950 and 2018. The field bird population is shown by the red merino wool, the woodland birds by the green and the water birds by the blue. 

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The piece is a continuation of my exploration of ways of interacting with data and ways of 'embodying' the information.  The involvement of my body in the physically stretching aspect of making the work was significant to me, as I gained an embodied understanding of the sharps falls and sustained 'level' periods of the various populations across the time period denoted. The unravelling and final 'rewinding' of the balls of woollen thread (i.e. the process of making and unmaking) changed the way I felt about the immutability of the data. 

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It was important to make the work if the formal garden of Dartington, which is almost an island of bird-friendly habitats in a sea of largely arable farmland which is no longer able to sustain significant bird populations due to the removal of hedgerows and intensive farming practices.

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The Temple is also the location of the piece of graffiti that informed the work 'Dear Earth'.