Past Projects

Hexagon artwork

State of Emergency: micro commissions

State of Emergency: micro commissions
This series of 19 micro-commissions by artists based in Plymouth, Devon and Cornwall was rolled out across our digital platforms in the summer of 2020, and explored the impact of the COVID-19 pandemic on our notion of freedom.

Leo Geyer

Leo Geyer is a young composer and conductor with a passion for imaginative, daring and dramatic approaches to music-making, encompassing new work, cross-disciplinary collaborations and re-imaginings of existing music.

Thomas Duggan

Thomas Duggan Studio is a collaborative and multidisciplinary research studio exploring the intersections between design, robotics, material science and sculpture.

Still Moving

Still/Moving Projects is a platform for the delivery of collaborative projects with a focus on engagement with targeted communities, co-directed by Devon based artists, Martin Hampton, Laura Hopes and Léonie Hampton.

Robert Darch

Robert Darch is an artist-photographer, educator and curator based in Exeter and is an Associate Lecturer in photography at Plymouth University and Falmouth University.

Richard Cook

Richard Cook’s subject matter is taken from quick, calligraphic drawing done in situ – mostly place of wilderness. In order to comply with government guidelines, Cook restricted his practice into making drawings from his own window.

Pete Geall

Pete Geall is a writer, surfer and professional lifeguard based in Newlyn, Cornwall.

Natasha Carthew

Natasha Carthew is an award-winning writer and performance poet from Cornwall. Her work goes deep beneath the core of what it is to live in rural UK today, exploring subjects such as social isolation, poverty, nature and environmental issues.

Naomi Hart

Naomi Hart is a multimedia artist who utilises salvaged materials and found objects to investigate and explore the relationship between human interaction and the environment, particularly themes around water, elements, journey and memory.

Molly Erin McCarthy

Molly Erin McCarthy is a visual artist from Plymouth, working across 3D and new media. For State Of Emergency Micro Commissions, McCarthy presents PROJECT MECHA:HEART, a series of animated, digital collages exploring data-hoarding and freedom of information in a post-internet, post-pandemic world.

Mary Loveday & Jason Hirons

Using two (ostensible) public drinking fountains in Plymouth, Mary Loveday and Jason Hirons have created a work of creative non-fiction writing which examines the intersection of public health and private self-interest or self-promotion.

Allister Gall

Allister Gall is an artist-filmmaker whose work explores the idea of Imperfect Cinema as an ongoing social and contemporary interrogation and re-employment (and re-imagining) of filmmaking as a social-participatory praxis.

Katy Richardson

Katy Richardson is an artist based in Plymouth. For the State of Emergency Commissions, Richardson has created a video that teaches a technique termed Soothing Rhythm Breathing (SRB).

Francesco Bentivegna

‘You Are Not Done Yet’ is a video work by artist and PhD student Francesco Bentivegna. His work focuses on posthuman voices in the form of synthetic voices.

Ellen Moran

Ellen Moran is a Geordie poet now living in East Devon. For the State of Emergency commissions, Moran has produced a spoken word piece which explores bodily autonomy, patriarchal control of bodies, physical containment and domestic slavery.

Crab & Bee

Crab & Bee is an artist collaboration (Bee is visual artist Helen Billinghurst and Crab is writer/performer Phil Smith) based in Plymouth.

Carly Seller

Carly Seller is an artist working with performance, sound, textiles, objects, drawings, photography and moving image. For the State of Emergency micro commissions, Seller has created a soft sculpture from which a bunch of hands and arms made from fabrics are suspended.

Beyond Face

Beyond Face CIC is a performance company based in Plymouth whose mission is to raise the profile and visibility of Black, Asian and People of Colour in the Arts. During the Covid-19 crisis, their mission felt more vital than ever.

Benjamin Dunks

For The Box State of Emergency micro-commissions Benjamin Dunks has produced an image that captures his body movement in his daily life in lockdown.

Becky Tyrrell

Becky Tyrrell is a freelance photographer living in West Penwith, Cornwall. For The Box State of Emergency micro-commissions Tyrrell has produced five portraits of people from her surroundings.