The Battle of Swap-Shop Ridge

by Alexander Stevenson, 4 Aug 2009

I’m over two weeks into a six week residency now, and thankfully the interactions I am having with islanders are becoming more meaningful and productive. I was worried that I might loose momentum and I wondered to what extent I would actually want the islanders’ input to drive the work? Also I was initially worried I might make some faux pas that would get me tarred and feathered.
Interestingly I have been talking about just such attitudes as this with several of my peers by phone (when the signal is able to bounce of the clouds at the correct angle/ time of day/ position of the moon or whatever). Is it possible that just such a conflict might produce a more interesting piece of work than something that could otherwise be seen as ‘straight’ or clear cut? I thoroughly enjoyed a presentation by Marcus Coates about a year ago, where he explained how a residency he had undertaken in which he created a large billboard, with a huge poster of himself in character, in the middle of a wood; led the local population to unite in burning it down, “It brought the community together in a beautiful and unusual way” he explained (I paraphrase).

I am currently having a little ‘battle of interests’ of my own it seems, though the enemy is unseen, perhaps even entirely in my own head. As you can see by the newly attached image, someone has come along and torn up some of the labelling work I have begun, and keeps removing the sign from the door stating “Sorting. Take what you like but please don’t rearrange the order, Cheers!”. I am imagining some brownie or sprite coming along each evening after I have been sorting in the remote Swap Shop and putting everything back where it was. In all likely-hood it is some overly attendant individual who didn’t get the memo and assumes someone is playing a prank. I find this really entertaining and have gone from feeling disgruntled to actually hoping they will return and do more mischief! The battle continues…

I have defined a clearer idea of the work I am undertaking in the swap shop now and I feel it might be good to place it here like a statement of intent:

I want to juxtapose the swap shop (with its cultural discards) with ideas of cultural heritage, and a fledgeling tourism industry. The items from the swap shop represent the globalised contemporary islander, whose cultural identity (represented here by their personal possessions) may be influenced by hundreds of other cultures. Hence I am going to re-order the swap-shop to reflect the provenance of these items.
This is no museum though, these objects: as ‘swappable’, are positioned to be given away as- “A Gift from Eigg”. And invites a new cultural object in it’s place as donation from the visitor.
By ‘branding’ each item with a symbol of the island, whoever takes an item away with them will maintain the association between the object and Eigg (regardless of it’s original provenance). And in many ways these objects away in the world that I have ‘branded’, could be seen as the ongoing artwork. This symbol (or set of symbols) will represent this “gift” idea in the spirit of tourist paraphernalia, thus depicting the island as ‘quaint’ (meaning: attractive yet unusual or old fashioned). These images might come from views and landmarks I come across that meet the criteria, and might include some of my own inventions or mythologising about the place (I have an idea to create a May-pole for sheep, and re-enact the traditional Eigg Guising of which there is no photo record). The essence of the images will be banal but with oddness hidden amongst it and every now and then complete invention.

On a separate note-
It might also be interesting to create a sign for the swap shop (as it doesn’t have one) explaining how the swap shop works, encouraging visitors to add a sticker to the base of any new items as they become assimilated, and explaining the wider reaching effects of this process towards an ever more multicultural and globalised Eigg.