April 2011 reader Alec Finlay has many irons in many fires. For details of his current projects, see below.

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Mountaineering in Counterpane

Alec will read ‘Mountaineering in Counterpane: a Report to the Armchair Mountaineering Club; other speakers include Misha Myers and Matthew Beaumont.

One-day symposium, presented by the University of Sunderland W.A.L.K. research initiative, seeking to interrogate the practice of walking in all its cultural, ethnographic, poetic, and geographical ramifications.

The Gymnasium, Gallery of Modern Art, Edinburgh
Thursday 28th July 2011, 12.30 – 17.00

For information contact Heather Yeung at: WALK@sunderland.ac.uk

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the road north

St Weems http://the-road-north.blogspot.com/2011/06/33-st-weems_23.html

Killin and Acharn http://the-road-north.blogspot.com/2011/06/7-killin-acharn_27.html

Monreith http://the-road-north.blogspot.com/2011/06/9-monreith.html

the hidden gardens http://the-road-north.blogspot.com/2011/07/53-hidden-gardens_07.html

You can follow Ken and Alec’s steps on their blog http://the-road-north.blogspot.com/

Visit The Road North website, where you can read Basho’s Oku-no-Hosomichi, the work that inspired the project http://www.theroadnorth.co.uk/

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mapping the road north

This hand-drawn map documents all of the ‘stations’ visited by Alec and Ken on their year-long journey, with a mirror-map listing Basho’s Japanese place-names.

You can view or download the full-size map here http://dl.dropbox.com/u/1599958/TRN%20mirror-map%20%28final%29.jpg

For a free map, send an A4 SAE to Luke Allan, Studio Alec Finlay, 36 Lime Street, Newcastle Upon Tyne, NE1 2PQ.

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the road north ‘sampler’

As part of the programme for this year’s Edinburgh International Festival, Alec and Ken will present a ‘sampler’ of The Road North, displaying hokku-labels, tea-prints and whiskies that characterized their 53 visits. The sampler can be viewed at the Scottish Poetry Library, Edinburgh from 5 August, running till 3 September. Edinburgh http://www.spl.org.uk/about/find.html

On 28 August, 12:00pm, Alec and Ken will be reading from the project, accompanied by director of SPL Robyn Marsack: @ The Hub (Royal Mile, Edinburgh) http://www.edinburghfestivals.co.uk/venues/hub?page=1

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T/H/E/C/I/T/Y/S/A/S/T/O/N/E/B/O/O/K

Alec has created a new civic grove for Victoria Gardens, Leeds. Three inter-related works on the theme of the city & pastoral have now been installed outside Leeds City Art Gallery. Among the formal screen of London Plane trees, 10 nest-boxes painted with QR codes offer e-links to field-recordings of birdsong by Chris Watson; in the Red Oak trees by the gallery entrance, S/I/N/G  W/I/L/D  K/I/N/D  W/O/O/D is an arrangement in 4×4 grids on next-boxes, echoing a phrase from John Berryman’s Dream Songs. T/H/E/C/I/T/Y/S/A/S/T/O/N/E/B/O/O/K is a stone-carved piece laid in the ground at the front of the Gallery, carved by Peter Coates. The digital print of this work will be available from Ingleby Gallery.

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‘Moss on Stone’

Alec & Robin Gillanders have collaborated on a portrait of Stonypath, Little Sparta, for Boulderpavement, published by The Banff Centre, now online at http://boulderpavement.ca/issue004/moss-on-stone/