M i c h a e l R M a y h e w
The work is conceived, produced, designed,
by Michael Mayhew
The work has been funded through;
Arts Council England, Private Sponsorship & Commissions
by Michael Mayhew
The work has been funded through;
Arts Council England, Private Sponsorship & Commissions
Occupied With art & life, life & art
‘At times, Mayhew’s work feels like the ‘growing pains’ of a seemingly
liberated generation for whom a sense of personal identity and integrity remained elusive.
What makes his witness of inner turmoil so poignant and
powerful is that he doesn’t opt for an exclusive introspection:
Mayhew’s journey towards self-knowledge encompasses far-ranging
confrontations with social mores at home and abroad –
he puts his emotions and his body on the line in order to challenge complacency and hypocrisy.’
Mary Brennan
liberated generation for whom a sense of personal identity and integrity remained elusive.
What makes his witness of inner turmoil so poignant and
powerful is that he doesn’t opt for an exclusive introspection:
Mayhew’s journey towards self-knowledge encompasses far-ranging
confrontations with social mores at home and abroad –
he puts his emotions and his body on the line in order to challenge complacency and hypocrisy.’
Mary Brennan
The Body as Site / Land as Site / Space as Site / Place as Site
Asking What it is to be Human
Locating ones self seems a perpetual occupation / where am I / where am I going / where have I been / when will I arrive and fro where am i arriving.This preoccupation is geographical, physical, metaphorical, psychological, metaphysical -
We perpetual map / locate / and this human need is embedded deeply into the process and practice.
Often drawn towards the liminal where the question of location becomes even more pertinent ones located inbetween locations, at the point of transformation and change - the nowhere and somewhere at the same time.
Mapping becomes essential in the process of this praxis, mapping and the use of maps are employed throughout.
It's always changing . . . .
Events Maker, Cultural Instigator, Composer, Re-generator, Writer, Maker, Searcher, Curator, Producer, Enquirer, Provocateur,
Collaborator, Inspirer, Conduit, Awarded, Sculpture, Challenger, Entertainer, Innovator, Optimist, Installer, Maverick,
Navigator, Researcher, Explorer, StoryTeller, Drifter, Performer, Electro-acoustic. Investigator, Painter, Lover.
Walk out
People & Place
Not as a tourist but as a human being.
Each location caries it's own identity,
rather than arriving and imposing into and onto space / place and so people
I under go a process that is shaped by the spaces / places and people.
Often arriving to walk, map, space, place and people -
It is a process of living within as opposed to our regulated imperialistic methodology of arriving
but not arriving ~ being yet not being ~
I arrive and I gather and collect
images, sound, fragments, experiences, voices, stories, colours, shapes, histories . . .
it is an immersive series of processes and one rooted in the need to locate
the self, the identity of self and others within the unknown of space and place.
I often arrive into locations with a series of structures (see above map) that
shift and alter course as I arrive and meet space, place, people, that begin to shape direction
of experiences of space that through becoming acquainted with become place and through knowing place
we know something of the people of that specific place.
I attempt to enable the spaces, places and people to have a voice and
attempt to voice the heard and unheard, the seen and unseen within
forms that arrive and are of spaces, places, people as opposed to implementing
a series of pre-determined series of ideas, forms and approaches making the outcomes undetermined,
enabling the practice to be perpetually refreshed.
This process has been nurtured in such diverse locations as;
England, Russia, China, Switzerland, America, Australia, Rumania, Denmark, Scotland, Republic of Ireland
Sites such as;
Housing estates, underground canals, ex-hospitals, warehouses, galleries, gardens,
stately homes, mills, museums, football pitches, tennis squash & courts, deserts, mountain ranges, universities . . .
This approach of not becoming fixed with singular forms of expression
extends and develops collaborative systems enabling me to engage within a multi-disciplinary practice
that enables the process and so the practice to engage with a diversity of audiences.
This approach does not homogenize or simplify the practice but stretches it into unexplored arenas of expression.
This web site is filled with ideas and references
to past work and future ideas & opportunities
that cover broad areas of processes and the outcomes from
the locations, the people and ideas.
From objects, to sound works, to performances, to films, to exhibitions, to large scale and small scale
ideas made real
made in art