1.0RENATUREDhttps://o-matic.com/blogMarinahttps://o-matic.com/blog/blog/author/admin/Things of course are nothing like what they appear. Land like any other time-based and event-based instance needs to be decoded or requires literacy to understand its stories. Last week I was generously welcomed to <a href="http://www.acart.org.uk/about%20us.html" target="_blank">Allenheads Contemporary Arts </a>by founders & artist producers  <a href="http://www.alansmith.org.uk/alansmithprojectarchive.htm" target="_blank">Alan Smith</a> and Helen Ratcliffe, and by Hannah Marsden, curator of their recent show <a href="http://exploringnostalgia.wordpress.com/events-2/the-allenheads-experience/" target="_blank">Exploring Nostalgia</a> (see earlier post on <a href="http://o-matic.com/blog//?p=841" target="_blank">dead moles in dresses).</a> Alan gave me an intense tour of the land, 2 hours of condensed experiential learning by car and foot - jumping up and down on the watershed land (a spongy trampoline), looking at charming, flower-strewn brooks (actually garbage middens from 19th c lead miners), and learning to read the vertical scars on the hills - channels made by huntsmen to drain the highland moors for better pheasant and grouse hunting conditions. Underground, a white-lime painted maze of tunnels that takes you forward in time as you go further in (newest last); this work of burrowing has, like worms, left giant-sized man-castings on the surface which look like naturally  picturesque bumps and hillocks. [caption id="" align="alignnone" width="422" caption="Sheep up on the high moors, Allenheads"]<img src="http://farm4.static.flickr.com/3593/3635628904_b8960a50de.jpg?v=0" alt="Sheep up on the high moor" width="422" height="281" />[/caption] [caption id="" align="alignnone" width="421" caption="Allenheads, old house/smelter remains"]<img src="http://farm4.static.flickr.com/3613/3635645110_269a23e7f7.jpg?v=0" alt="Allenheads, old house remains" width="421" height="280" />[/caption] [caption id="" align="alignnone" width="421" caption="Stream at bend of  the original cart road into Allenheads"]<img src="http://farm4.static.flickr.com/3638/3634861385_2c3390d89f.jpg?v=0" alt="Allenheads - near the original cart road into Allenheads" width="421" height="280" />[/caption] [caption id="" align="alignnone" width="421" caption="Alan Smith"]<img src="http://farm3.static.flickr.com/2433/3634855535_d20249886a.jpg?v=0" alt="Alan Smith" width="421" height="280" />[/caption] [caption id="" align="alignnone" width="422" caption="Allenheads Contemporary Art  family members Kaiser and Messerschmidt"]<img src="http://farm4.static.flickr.com/3410/3634858137_9a00e377a0.jpg?v=0" alt="Allenheads Contemporary Art Center family members Kaiser and Messerschmidt" width="422" height="281" />[/caption] [caption id="" align="alignnone" width="419" caption="Allenheads community member"]<img src="http://farm3.static.flickr.com/2459/3634850811_01051b9923.jpg?v=0" alt="Allenheads community member" width="419" height="279" />[/caption] I thought there was an odd and distant kinship to New York/Staten Island's<a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fresh_Kills_Landfill" target="_blank"> Fresh Kills</a> Landfill, of a long term land shape that's formed from the inside out, entirely by man (see<a title="Permanent Link: Why Call Them Landfills? They are dumps, eyesores, middens and disgraces." rel="bookmark" href="http://censys.org/blog/?p=824"> "Why Call Them Landfills? They are dumps, eyesores, middens and disgraces."</a>) <p style="text-align: center;"></p> [caption id="attachment_1327" align="aligncenter" width="250" caption="Fresh Kills - Then and Now (over the years)"]<img class="size-full wp-image-1327" title="09-494-freshkills2" src="http://o-matic.com/blog//wp-content/uploads/2009/06/09-494-freshkills2.jpg" alt="Fresh Kills - Then and Now (over the years)" width="250" height="480" />[/caption]rich