Saturday 9 November 2013

Triquetra - The story of three Viking Kings for Illuminating York 2013


Viking Shield Wall, originally uploaded by Ross Ashton.
You can see the full video here. 

What can we say about York? We are always so happy to back and be allowed to create work in this fantastic city.  I will admit to being biased. I am a Yorkshireman after all, so its a privilege to have worked here so often.

Triquetra was the third work that Karen Monid and I have created here. The first was Accendo in 2008 and that was followed by Rose in 2010. Each time we have been allowed to choose an iconic part of the architecture of York to work with.


This time we really wanted to create something different. We have projected onto landscapes before, but its not often that we would have the opportunity to project onto landscape and architecture, especially not in an urban setting. This is what we found special about choosing the site of Clifford's Tower at the Eye of York as our canvas. 

Standing 25m tall and 75m wide, this is a unique architectural feature in that it is still of a size that can be addressed with a reasonable number of projectors whilst still dominating the space in which it stands.


The Midgard Serpent, originally uploaded by Ross Ashton.

The history behind Triquetra is best read on Karen's blog (see links below), and I wont repeat it all here, except to say that it talks of three Viking Kings, Harald Bluetooth, Sweyn Forkbeard and Cnut the Great and their dynastic journey from being pagan kings of Denmark to being Christian kings of a mini empire and early kings of all England.  

On the way we illustrated in sound and image: 
The creation of the world from the Viking perspective.
The destruction of Lindisfarne.
The invasion of England.
The letter from King Cnut to his people from the York Gospels.
Karens Triquetra history blog entries: Part 1 : Part 2



Triquetra logo 2, originally uploaded by Ross Ashton.

Karen and I would like to thank:
Sang, Thierry and Steve at The Projection Studio
Richard and QED for projection equipment
Tom Vickers AVLS for sound equipment
Ben Pugh for his support throughout
and of course Illuminating York for commissioning this work.

Press:
York Press