David Blandy

Soil, Sinew & Bone, 2022

Soil, Sinew and Bone (2022) is created from archival film footage from Screen Archive South East, weaving a line through documentary, essay and poetry around farming and war. Capturing the final years of horse-drawn farm machinery and the beginning of industrialized mechanisation, the artist links disparate places and times, connecting nitrates as fertiliser, as explosive weapon of war and as the very material of film. The film reflects on how humanity has now found itself on the brink of environmental collapse. 

Blandy also engages with the wider range of the archive, from the cottage industry of chicken rearing in the 1930’s to a Florida based phosphate factory, to a shrine on the island of Miyajuma in Japan, looking out towards Hiroshima only a year or two before the horrific Atomic bomb was dropped on the city.

Children are at the heart of the film, at work in the fields, born into the darkness of the blackout in the Second World War, at play under threat from bombs and gas.

A mesmeric reflected image, rich soundtrack and reflective voice-over draw the viewer through the history of a critical period in the 20th century, and invite us to consider how the events of the past continue to impact our present lives.

Inspired by Rachel Carson, Donna Haraway and Hannah Arendt, the film considers the lives behind the images in the archive, their place in social history and the nature of the archive itself.

Soil, Sinew and Bone was supported by Arts Council England, The Elephant Trust and Screen Archive South East.

David Blandy - Atomic Light, John Hansard Gallery
11 February 2023–6 May 2023

Soil, Sinew & Bone was part of Atomic Light, David Blandy’s most ambitious solo project to date and expanded on his Artist Residency at Towner Gallery, Eastbourne in 2022. Featuring four newly commissioned films, it builds upon his continued interest in history, the legacy of empire and the climate crisis.

The tales interconnect through the story of Blandy’s grandfather, a British soldier interred in Singapore as a Japanese prisoner of war, who believed that the horrific atomic bombing of Hiroshima saved his life. The Edge of Forever and Empire of the Swamp were shot on location and feature the landscapes of the UK and Singapore. Archival footage is used in Sunspot, where two Observatories both detect the same sun on the day an atomic sun was made on earth; the Hiroshima bomb that killed 100,000 people. Similarly, in Soil, Sinew & Bone a history of war and a history of agriculture are mirrored, the fertile earth of phosphates and nitrates reflected into weapons of war.

Installation view: Photos: Reece Straw

Atomic Light was co-commissioned by John Hansard Gallery and Towner Eastbourne, with support from Arts Council England, Screen Archive South East and Elephant Trust.