Simon Faithfull launches 'Fake Moon' and 'Shy Fountain' in Bristol
Date uploaded: February 6, 2013
Fake Moon | College Green | Bristol | InBetweenTime Festival 13 | 14-17 February
Shy Fountain | College Square | Bristol | Permanent artwork launches 15 February
Wanderings | ICIA | Bath | 26 April - 31 May
An unsteady new moon traces an arc across the night skies of Bristol and in one of the city’s modern squares, a fountain seems only to exist when no-one is there. Artist Simon Faithfull’s magical manipulations of the fabric of Bristol interweave the everyday with the otherworldly through works melding myth, illusion and fakery.
Presented at In Between Time 13, the city’s international performance festival, Faithfull’s Fake Moon will rise from behind the trees on College Green, Bristol‘s popular gathering place, reaching its zenith an hour later. At first the apparition seems to be the familiar planet but its journey seems too halting and wobbling, and it shines too brightly. Finally waning (assisted by hoist and pulley), an hour or so later, the orb touches the ground and reposes until its performance the following evening.
Not far away in College Square, the mysterious Shy Fountain can be glimpsed at a distance jetting its water into the air. However, as the viewer draws near, the fountain suddenly stops, leaving only a few splashes of water as evidence of its recent presence. If the onlooker remains completely still, they become a complicit witness when the fountain regains confidence and gradually comes back to life.
In April, Faithfull opens Wanderings at ICIA (institute of Contemporary Interdisciplinary Arts) in Bath which brings together realised artworks as well as the concepts for unrealised projects.
Wanderings presents Going Nowhere 2, a video in which the artist walks through a landscape at the bottom of the Adriatic Sea and the drawing project Limbo – An Expanding Atlas of Subjectivity of all the 956 drawings Faithfull has made over the last 12 years including Antarctica Dispatches from his two month journey to Antarctica, and Liverpool to Liverpool made during a one month journey by container ship to Nova Scotia.
Fake Moon (2013) is presented by IBT 13 International Festival of Performance.
Shy Fountain (2013) was commissioned by Crest Nicholson for the Canon’s Marsh development.
Fake Moon (2013). 6pm-7:30pm, 14-17 February 2013. College Green, Bristol, BS1. Admission free. Moon Salon: 6pm-7pm, 15 February Council House tbc, College Green, Bristol, BS1. Price £3. Simon Faithfull discusses the history of lunar apparition, hoax and myth. http://ibt13.co.uk
Shy Fountain (2013). A permanent public artwork: 2 College Sq, Anchor Rd, Bristol Harbourside, Bristol BS1 5UE. Click here for further information.
Wanderings (26 April – 31 May 2013). Art Space 1 and 2, ICIA, 1 East 2.1, University of Bath, Claverton Down, Bath BA2 7AY. Open Mon – Fri 10am-5pm. Admission free. Click here for further information.
