Holy Saturday

Station 14 - Jesus is laid in the tomb*

still
be still
be still and know
God
born
still God
still man
still born
still born among us
God
in flesh appearing
defenceless
helpless
needing us
all-knowing
un-knowing
all present
confined in space
a child
God child
incarnate
incarnate still
be still
be still and know

still
be still
be still and know
God
dead
still God
still man
still buried
still buried in the ground
God
in flesh appearing
defenceless
helpless
killed by us
falling
buried
germinating
growing
a seed
God man
incarnate
incarnate still
be still
be still and know

* The first verse of this meditation is by Alan Stewart.


In between

Between the action and its consequence
Between knowledge and its understanding
Between the invitation and the party
Between the longest day and the last day

The stone not rolled away
The tomb still guarded
The friends still scattered
The promise known
but not understood
The body still still

The still time
The still waiting time
The time between times
The last times
In between

Between suffering, aloneness, unutterable waste
and the dream of liberation and rebirth,
ours is the long days journey of the Saturday

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Mahalia Jackson - Were You There When They Crucified My Lord?

Stations2017: Stations of the Cross & Stations of the Resurrection

Stations of the Cross brought together fourteen video works by Mark Dean that reinterpreted the medieval tradition of spiritual pilgrimage through contemplation of the path Jesus walked to Calvary on the day of his crucifixion. The videos are not literal depictions of this journey. They rely upon Dean’s trademark appropriation of film and video footage and music, to introduce visual and aural puns that generate and interrogate meaning within the work, setting up disputations between the different elements being sampled. Although the work is carefully constructed, the reverberations created by placing potent symbols side by side are myriad. The work was projected in sequence onto the circular Henry Moore altar at St Stephen Walbrook throughout the night on Easter Eve, interspersed with readings and space for meditation. Participants were invited to stay for the duration but remained free to come and go, as part of a vigil culminating in a performance of A Prelude to Being Here by two dancers from Lizzi Kew Ross & Co and an optional dawn Eucharist. 

If you would like to view these video works, they are now online at: http://tailbiter.com/art/stations-of-the-cross together with the catalogue essay and the readings used during the Vigil.

Here Comes The Sony is a twelve-screen video and sound work, installed for the first time under the dome of St Paul’s Cathedral during Eastertide (Wednesday 26 April). It reinterprets the less definitive tradition of the Stations of the Resurrection, which emerged to encourage meditation on the resurrection appearances of Jesus recorded in the New Testament. Being Here, devised by choreographer Lizzi Kew Ross and the dancers, is performed on the stage formed by the circular placement of television monitors under the dome. Five dancers emerge from the shadows around the edge of the stage and start to navigate the space, sometimes individually and sometimes in groups of far-off and nervous proximity. The on-lookers find themselves within the action of these movements. While not enacting the narratives, the dance performance is an interpretation of the moment, producing a sense of a shared journey and progression through time and space and enabling the audience to curate the tension and distance between the installation and their own responses.

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Planxty - As I Roved Out.

Grete Refsum: Easter Installation

In an interesting article on the ArtWay website, Grete Refsum describes the installation that she created in Nøtterøy parish church (county Vestfold, Norway) during Easter 2014.

Part I, Skje din vilje, was laid out before Palm Sunday and used broken wine bottles, a substantial part of which were altar wine bottles from the Cathedral of Oslo. The installation took its point of departure from the Lord’s Prayer, with the words ’Thy will be done’. This phrase was written on the floor under the pulpit in broken glass from wine bottles.

Part II, I Am, was laid on Holy Saturday. The congregation collected transparent recycled glass during Lent that was then used for the work. Part II takes its point of departure in the oldest definition of the concept of God in the Bible, where God is revealed to Moses and says: ’I am who I am.’ This phrase stands out in a circle of broken glass as absence of material.

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Adrian Snell - Gethsemene.