From Lostwithiel to Dobwalls to Trago

GPS traces of last week's expedition.

Nested signs in nested landscapes

Our experiments in spatial detournement are beginning to show up within the "official" Google Maps site.


Click here to view live
or click View Larger Map (in the live link below) then More.. and tick Videos


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The methods that we have briefly dealt with here are presented not as our own invention, but as a generally widespread practice which we propose to systematize.

We will postpone the development of these theses until later.

see also
http://www.artcornwall.org/webprojects/bod%20moor.swf

The Walls of Dobbe

Using a dowsing instrument like a map, or a digitalised aerial photograph, allows your subconscious to tap in to the wealth of information available from this superconscious energy.
aerial photo from google maps




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the above as embedded data

see also http://nigelayers.blogspot.com/2010/02/walls-of-dobbe.html

It follows, therefore, that dowsing using digital information is the most physical type of dowsing because it is closely related to your body's own sensitivity to the informational currents that surround us. Using computer graphics in this research allows the physical body to tune in to electrical currents. It becomes more psychic in nature however, because you really have to let your rational mind let go of preconceptions in order to get in touch with energies of which you may not be fully conscious. This simple intuition is the reason many people talk to their computers.

http://bodminmoorzodiac.blogspot.com/

The Virgin of Dobwalls

Kinetic Figurine by Nigel Ayers. 18 cm / 7 inches high. Slow motion video.

The Walls of Dobbe

The Walls of Dobbe, a group of three stone circles in the village of Dobwalls, Cornwall. These circles are interpreted as aspects of a lunar goddess. The first circle represents the left hand crescent moon, or virgin, and comprises of seven irregular granite stones. The second circle, represents the full moon or mother, also comprises seven irregular stones of similar height. The third circle represents the left hand crescent moon or crone and stands beside a row of trees. It consists of six stones, one of which is distinctively pointed and taller than the rest. As water courses run below the stone circles, the power of the stones are encapsulated and controlled by the cultural form of the triple circle. The centre axis of the circles extends southwards into an accurate moon observation line, whilst to the north it marks the rising of the star Spica. These stones of the triple mother-circle are finely and firmly set. They are cleft but not further tooled. At the centre of each stone circle the original carved and finished central stones have been replaced by cast iron plates.

These stones of the triple mother-circle are finely and firmly set. They are cleft but not further tooled. At the centre of each stone circle the original carved and finished central stones have been replaced by cast iron plates. Each plate is inscribed with a replica of the labyrinths that were originally carved on the central stones. These labyrinths seem to have served as dance mats in the triple centres of this ritual place.

Sacred Dance Mat

The honouring of Sophia as the mystical bride of the philosophers or "mistress of the inner world" , often intersects with worship of divine Mercurial water. Here, the tree-crowned Sophia stands upon a sacred dance mat.


The dance mat is inscribed with a labyrinth design. The labyrinth is a weaving or spinning image, referring to a woman's capacity to weave a child in the fabric of her own body. A Hindu birth ritual involves sketching the labyrinth in saffron on a bronze plate and washing it off with water. It is then fed to the pregnant woman.This thereby permits the child to move easily through the labyrinthine seven uterine "wombs". There are two holes cut through the dance mat plates marking where a cord (representing the umbilical cord) may have been threaded.

T' Owd Tup

That's me,In the guise of T'Owd Tup, doing my bit for t'Derbyshire folklore back in 1975 - in the Mummer's play also known as the Derby Ram.
Tidza Tupping Team won first prize in Eyam carnival you know.

From the cover of Brian Woodall's 1976 Calendar of Events.

Caroline K: Now Wait For Last Year

Klang Galerie have just re-issued Caroline's solo LP on CD with 3 extra tracks of her trademark moody electronics. Here are some scans:



and a link:
Klang Galerie

Road Cone on Bude Light

Dobwalls Roundabout/ Virgo's Nipple

Google Map View of The Virgin's Nipple

Highways Agency: Aerial View of Planned A38 Dobwalls Bypass Scheme
Virgo: The Dobwalls Virgin: as seen in the Bodmin Moor Zodiac Visualisation.



GPS traces: The Virgin's Nipple Circumnavigated: 11th February 2010

Constructed by Master Masons of the Highways Agency, The Virgin's Nipple is a ritual motor vehicle trackway designed to stimulate an erogenous zone within the Giant Effigy of Virgo in the Bodmin Moor Terrestrial Zodiac.

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Bodmin Moor Zodiac book review

Nigel Ayers, "The Bodmin Moor Zodiac"

Written by Justin Patrick

Sunday, 10 January 2010

Since 2006 Nigel Ayers work has been focused on the investigation of folklore and geography of place, specifically his home in Cornwall, England. As part of his ongoing guerilla sign ontology campaign to boycott consensus reality he undertook a series of ritual walks into Cornwall’s sacred landscape, documented in this book from 2007. Part narrative essay and part scientific log, with ample photographic evidence provided by his wife Lesley, it follows Nigel’s journey into the Otherworld through the zodiac gateways of the Bodmin Moor. Earthly Delights As I read this book my consciousness was systematically disarranged. Nigel Ayers does to the landscape what William S. Burroughs and Brion Gysin did with text, using cut-ups and fold-ins as a method for designing the ritual walking routes. He also employs the Situationist technique of detournement applying it to a territory or space, calling it spatial detournement. Contrasting this idea with the concept of recuperation (when originally seditious ideas and cultural works are appropriated by the mainstream) Nigel has created a technique for revolutionary rambling, where the walker, “reuses elements of a known territory to explore a new psychic space with a different meaning.” This meaning steps past established boundaries leading the walker into frontiers that have not yet been demarcated. The subject of his investigation is the terrestrial zodiac of the Bodmin Moor, an enormously scaled map of the stars formed by the features of a landscape, such as lanes, creeks, hedges and walls. The Bodmin Moor is famous for its many rocky granite tors. It is also legendary among cryptozoologists as being inhabited by the Beast, a phantom cat sighted on numerous occasions and rumored to have slain and mutilated livestock in the area. The idea of terrestrial zodiacs, disputed by the scientific establishment, remains a popular motif among folklorists and in occult circles. The book is illustrated with trace maps of the ritual walks made by a novel use of global positioning satellites for each of the twelve zodiac signs explored. These are used comparatively with the shapes of Cornwall’s Bodmin Moor landscape zodiac, illustrated with cut outs in the proper constellation shape from a road map, with the shapes made by the ritual walks. It is remarkable how close the GPS trace maps resemble the shapes of the constellations, and is part of what makes this book such an important artifact. The chapters for each sign also contain bits and pieces of curious lore about the star signs and the stories behind them. These chapters also describe things observed along the routes that correspond to the various characteristics associated with the zodiac signs and their constellations. This shows off the fractal concept Nigel calls “nested signs in nested landscapes.” These parts of the text read more like a logbook, yet the way he manages to tie disparate ideas together holds my attention. Audio field recordings were also made as part of the documentation of this psychogeographic project. Later they were used in a sound installation called The Planetarium Must Be Built! consisting of multiple CD players placed in a circle within a geodesic dome, along with visual material, and things to interact with such as books and texts. I am curious to hear these recordings and it would have been a nice touch if the book had come with a CD containing a selection of the recordings. However, with this book being a print-on-demand title I can understand how it might not have been easy logistically or cost effective to include a disc. Maybe they’ll turn up on some future Nocturnal Emissions material (he has been known to use field recordings extensively in the past on such masterpieces as Stoneface/SpiritFlesh among others). With the work recorded here Nigel Ayers has done a service to the field of psychogeography. While he does not encourage walking on the same routes as he made, stating rather that people should make up their own, he does provide a blueprint and methodology that can be used as a starting point for other people who wish to further explore and use landscapes creatively. The book, heavy with applied artistic theory, also shows him as being comfortably at home in the 21st century, a true multimedia and multidimensional artist working on several levels simultaneously.

cut & pasted from
http://brainwashed.com/index.php?option=com_content&task=view&id=8015&Itemid=1

get the book here
http://www.lulu.com/content/paperback-book/bodmin-moor-zodiac/1101129