We are excited to present Andrew Black’s Margaret Tait Award commission ‘On Clogger Lane’ (2023) at Cove Burgh Hall with support from Cove Park, as part of a UK tour.
‘On Clogger Lane’ tells the story of a depopulated valley on ancient land. The film follows routes through a dammed, drowned and depopulated valley in Northern England, exploring the infrastructures of capital on land overshadowed by a monstrous satellite surveillance station, submerged beneath reservoirs, haunted by accusations of witchcraft, and populated by indecipherable prehistoric carvings and the graves of child labourers. Incorporating conversations with farmers, antiquarians, dowsers, grandmothers, Quakers, landowners and communists alongside an improvisational score,‘On Clogger Lane’ is an experimental documentary which navigates the chaotic mix of passivity and protest, public and private, past and present, all coincident in the same patch of ancient countryside.
Established in 2010, the Margaret Tait Commission is a LUX Scotland commission delivered in partnership with Glasgow Film, supported by The National Lottery through Creative Scotland. Inspired by the pioneering Orcadian filmmaker and poet Margaret Tait (1918 – 99), the commission recognises experimental and innovative artists working with the moving image, offering a unique avenue of commissioning and production support and providing a high-profile platform to exhibit newly commissioned work.
Programme:
3pm – Introduction
3:05 – Screening of ‘On Clogger Lane’ (60 mins)
4:05 – Comfort break
4:15 – Discussion and Q&A with Andrew Black
5:15 – Tea and coffee
6pm – End
Andrew Black is an artist and filmmaker. He studied at Leeds College of Art and the Glasgow School of Art. His films are portraits of places to which he has a biographical attachment and look at how capitalism, militarism and nationalist ideologies intrude into and shape the land and its inhabitants and how communities imagine themselves in relation or opposition to this. He was the 2021 recipient of the Margaret Tait Award, and his commissioned film On Clogger Lane premiered at Glasgow Film Theatre in February 2023, and will show at LUX, London in 2024. His work has shown at CCA Glasgow, Dundee Contemporary Arts and Centre Clark, Montreal.
Andrew previously took part in the Experimental Film and Artists’ Moving Image Residency, in partnership with Cove Park and Alchemy Film and Moving Image Festival, in 2018.
‘On Clogger Lane’ is captioned by Valery Tough.
The introduction and Q&A will be live captioned.
The event is free to attend, but ticketed. The screening will take place in the Main Hall of Cove Burgh Hall. Tickets are available to book directly here.
For more information please see Cove Burgh Hall’s website.
Thematic content notes:
Depictions of police aggression
Discussions of historical indentured child labour
Visual depiction of dead animals (bird)
Discussions of historical femicide and misogyny
Discussions of asylums and historical mental health hospitals
Sensory content notes:
Flashing imagery at 26 minutes in for 1 minute, and at 53 minutes in for 30 seconds.
Image description: A person standing in front of a tall metal fence topped with razor wire faces the camera. They wear a high vis jacket and hold an upside down American flag with the text ‘No To War’ painted over it in black stencil. Through the fence large geodesic domes stretch into the distance.
Cove Burgh Hall is accessible via car and public transport, including:
For bus timetables, click here.
For train and ferry timetables, click here.
To plan your journey, please use this map.
There is parking at the hall.
The Margaret Tait Commission is a LUX Scotland commission delivered in partnership with Glasgow Film, with support from Creative Scotland.