Swap-Shop Fandango

by Alexander Stevenson, 27 Jul 2009

It’s been over a week now since I landed on shore, and I am settling in very well. The public information letters that I sent out before my arrival are starting to tally-up in the islanders’ minds, with the strange late-twenties gentleman who keeps cycling around the island; saying hello to everyone and asking what they think of the place.
There is a strong drinking and dancing culture on Eigg that anyone who has joined the community in the last thirty years has taken on as their own. It’s a great way to meet people and ask them questions. But personally I find it hard to see straight, let alone think straight when I’m nursing my fith red-can; so I’m trying to meet folks in other myriad ways.
There is the inter-island games coming up on the 15th (all welcome!) this year hosted on Eigg, and I’ve put my name down to help with the preparations for the Eigg-n-spoon, the sack race, and the tug of war etc. It’s really nice that such things still happen. And ties in well with the pub-mumming play still planned for the 24th. I have long wondered if wider-reaching public art is a reaction to the death of many of these fetes and carnivals at the hands of the dreaded ‘Health n’ Safety’?

Feeling positive about intereviews today. I need to get at least another twenty to create a really comprehensive audiowork from them in September. There are lots of people who are saying they will come and chat with me at somepoint after the games, and who don’t seem to need it explaining particularly so all the information I sent is getting through. I get a sense from people that either they’d be happy to to be interviewed, or that they never will!

I also realised that I really need to get on with the swap shop this week and next if I want it done in time, and it’s going to be a really tricky piece to pull-off: hence the ‘fandango’!
I am really interested in the cultural influences that have helped to shape the contemporary island, so I am thinking of persuing the re-ordering of the swap shop to represent the place in the world each object was made. There are plenty of items that came from all over Europe from places that you wouldn’t expect, and obviously lots from China, Australia, USA. etc. There is a plastic flute/recorder from Italy, a teasppon rack from North America, plates from all over England and France, plastic wares from Czechoslovakia, and the books are even more ridiculously well travelled; for instance- there are are English language childrens books printed in Budhapest and Tokyo, and a London Guide Book, printed in Singapore!

When someone looks at Eigg, perhaps, buys something from the gift shop, they aren’t just buying ‘’a gift from Eigg’‘. They are taking away all of the influences imbued upon that object. This taps-in really well to a chapter I wrote last year for an academic book on ’materiality’ (a PDF is available from www.museumcabinet.com).

That London city guide printed in Singapore, or the English language guide to Italy printed in Germany; perfectly represents the way multi-culturalism and globalism shape our perception of ourselves, and affect what we associate with a place. These guide books have become cultural artefacts ‘from Eigg’. Also, I really like the ‘gift’ ideology. The swap shop exists because people don’t want to throw things away- (it’s an Eco sin!). So “A Gift From Eigg” means: please take it away!- but it still exists as a cultural artefact of the island, as much as any tourist paraphenalia (probably more because it was once owned by an islander).

I’m working on logo’s that can represent this over the next two weeks between interviews and I might start posting up prototypes as I go. Be good to use this blog as a source of feedback.

One thing that is clear about undertaking a residency of this kind, is it never makes the list of options open to me any smaller the longer I am here. Rather than focusing in at this early stage; I feel as if I may be drowned in subtleties, interrelationships, and wholly new choices!