A workshop for PhD students, ECRs and staff at London South Bank University on Tuesday, 8th April, 2025 [12-3, meet in Borough Road Gallery].
We walk for exercise, for leisure, for transportation, for contemplation. We walk by choice or out of necessity, with ease or with difficulty, alone or with others. This workshop, grounded in the ideas of Pauline Oliveros and various contemporary walking artists, explores what else the act of walking makes possible. Solitary and small group exercises will address walking as a pedagogical tool, as an artistic methodology, as a mode of listening, and as a vehicle for connection or intervention.
Workshop facilitator Dr. Rachel Epp Buller is an artist and art historian whose current research explores listening as an artistic practice. She is a two-time Fulbright US Scholar, a certified practitioner in Deep Listening, and a Professor of Visual Arts and Design at Bethel College (US).
Note: Like many scholars, I use the term “walking” expansively to include various abilities and forms of mobility. Please indicate any accessibility issues or need for accommodations when registering for the workshop.
Assignment:
To prepare for this workshop, set aside an hour of time to go for a walk in a place where you feel most able to slow down and pay attention. This might be in a city park, or in a quiet residential area, or out in the countryside. Sometime during this walk, listen to Winter Walking, a 23-minute sound piece that I created in 2022 as a meditation on walking and listening while walking every day for 120 days in northern Alberta, Canada.
We will spend some time during the workshop discussing your experience of walking and listening with this piece. Questions for discussion to consider:
* What sounds did you recognize / seemed familiar to you when you listened to Winter Walking?
* What sounds did you wonder about?
* What words, phrases, and ideas stood out as you listened to the ten-part meditation on the imperative of walking, and why?
* What connections or contrasts did you notice between the sounds of Winter Walking and the sounds of the environment in which you were walking?
* What connections or contrasts can you draw between Winter Walking and your own experiences of a winter season? How have you experienced changes in winter seasons over the course of your lifetime?
image: Rachel Epp Buller leading a workshop on listening and sharing knowledge through our bodies, at Flutgraben, Berlin, July 2018.