The River Path
Granite Song
This book is a celebration of the unique collaboration
between arts/environment group
Common Ground
and the sculptor
Peter Randall-Page,
documented in colour and b&w photographs by
Chris Chapman.
Essays by:
Marina Warner
(writer, broadcaster, Reith Lecturer),
Jane Hayter-Hames
(local landholder and writer),
Eric Robinson
(former President of the Geologists' Association),
Sue Clifford and Angela King
(initiators, founder directors of
Common Ground).
Clive, Jill and Tom Adams and printed by Pale Green Press.
Published by Devon Books ~ £24.95
95pp with over 60 photographs in colour and b&w
large format hardback 210 x 245
ISBN 1 85522 685 5.
This book describes a new way of working and thinking about the role of sculpture and its contribution to our everyday places.
In her essay, Marina Warner says: "With tact and discretion, Common Ground have renegotiated the tricky territory of public art, and developed a fresh approach, which does not make bombastic declarations about History or Heroism, but adds quietly to the tally of selected points of personal orientation".
Background
In 1989 the environment/arts charity Common Ground won the first Prudential Award for Visual Arts. The prize money was for a new commission - we decided to ask the sculptor Peter Randall-Page to create a series of sculptures in his own home place (north Devon) which would respond to the locality and reinforce and extend the particularity of the place - as part of our campaign for Local Distinctiveness. At the same time, we commissioned the photographer Chris Chapman to interweave his own art to capture all of the activities involved.
Peter started work in 1990 and slowly, after many discussions and meetings with local people, he completed the sixth and last piece six years later.
This project owes its success not only to Peter Randall-Page's artistic ability, but also to his sensitivity to people and his surroundings.
"The sculptures of Peter Randall-Page, dispersed by him in eloquently selected intervals in the countryside, open up a new story through this ancient custom of treading personal meaning into the earth itself...." Marina Warner.
Funding came from the Prudential Insurance plc,
Henry Moore Foundation, Elmgrant Trust, South West Arts,
Devon County Council, with additional help from Dartmoor National Park,
Rural Action, The Elephant Trust, Merrivale Ouarries,
The Fleet Air Arm, The National Trust, many local people and Pale Green Press.
The book too has been many years in gestation, and it owes its existence to the tenacity of Peter Randall-Page and Clive Adams, without Clive's perseverence and attention to detail it would never have been completed.
For Further Information, please contact
Sue Clifford/Angela King at Common Ground - +44(0)1747 850820.
Review Copies: Denise Lyons - Marketing Manager, Devon Books,
tel: +44(0)1884 243242. fax: +44(0)1884 243325.
Read more about Peter Randall Page's work with Common Ground on www.commonground.org.uk
