Sunday 30 October
Wales Millennium Centre, Cardiff
When you were younger, did you ever throw a meter-squared transect onto the floor and count the worms and spiders living within the borders? This is just what what arts organisation 1mile² do, just with a few small differences. Instead of looking for minibeasts, 1mile² focus on the diversity of life within one particular community. They commission an international artist to bring a new perspective into their host community and invite local artists, performers and speakers to join the discussion. Oh, and to enable longer discussions and introduce the possibility of dance, their events are all conducted on a slightly larger scale.
Past projects have seen the organisation head to Johannesburg, where ecologists and gallery owners came together among food growing workshops and guided biodiversity walks. In Smethwick, local metalwork played a key part and London-based artist Andrew Dodds joined Iranian artists to creatively explore a community in Tehran. What’s clear from these three collective square miles, and their equivalents in other regions in the UK and internationally, is that 1mile²’s projects are emphatically tailored to the communities within which they reside. Blending art and science within inclusive free events, 1mile²’s projects balance a broad subject matter which gives everyone the chance to have their say within a specific, geographically-exclusive location.
1mile² have been in Cardiff for six months now, focusing on Butetown, Grangetown and Splott together with National Dance Company Wales and Bangalore-based photographer Mahesh Shantaram. Speaking of the restrictions of the project at the NDC Wales’s Scheherazade 2011 event on Friday, founding director Roy Campbell-Moore observed, ‘we decided that 1mile² was a place in the head.’ The result is a creative piece firmly planted in Cardiff, yet flexible and inclusive when it comes to representing the city.
On Sunday, 1mile² will be hosting a day of performances, workshops and exhibitions which will explore Cardiff in more depth. India Dance Wales, Jukebox, Rubicon, Ballet Nimba and Planet Gymnastics Parkour Group will all be present to share their own interpretations of the city through dance workshops and performance. Budding poets, seamstresses and musicians will also have the chance to channel their inspiration in free classes throughout the day.
The events will run from 12:00-18:30. For more details, visit www.square-mile.net
