30-01-2023 | Windmill Walking and Quantum Listening

Having found my field trip to Dartmoor invaluable in terms of considering ways of connecting to memory, identity and the domestic archive, I decided to revisit an old walk from my teenage years. I remember the countless times I have made this walk, whether alone or with my family and our previous dog. I see from the leaflets available, encased in a wooden bird box by the path, that its official name is 'Beacon Hill Nature Reserve, Rottingdean', though we always called it the "windmill walk" due to its impressive mill built at the turn of the 19th Cenury. There are so many ways to make this walk, and though the area is relatively tiny by comparison to Dartmoor's rainforests, its pathways are many and their iterations, seemingly infinite. Looking out towards the Channel, I can see my old school to the right and my old home to the left. This place is steeped in memory, both visually, but also aurally. I am reading Pauline Oliveros' 'Quantum Listeneing' and am reminded of the power held in the simple activity of voluntary listening practices, opposed to involuntary hearing. Standning still for a moment I can hear all those layers I associate with my youth, my family, my home. Firstly there is the singing sky larks that have nested precariously on the ground, the male hovering overhead on lookout. Then the wind rushing through the long grass, making patterns, followed by distant traffic swooshing - nature and culture juxtaposed. As I approach the village side, someone is mowing or sawing, perhaps drilling and I remember Oliveros' words 'No part of the planet is untouched by machine sound'. All at once I feel immersed in the past and distanced from it, held at arms length. This activity of walking, recording, documenting, once more connects me to those ideas of archival practice I have become enmeshed with and the longing I have to belong. It is helping me understand why the archive is important to me, and why examining landscapes from my memory aid my practice of art making towards understanding my history and identity. From a practical perspective, unfortunately the recordings suffer from “popping” caused by the wind I’ve described, I have since invested in mufflers for my Tascam recorder to help reduce this issue on future field recordings.

1. ​​Oliveros, Pauline, Quantum Listening (Ignota Books, 2022)

2. All photography and field recordings by Amanni Hassan Hollands, 2023