University News Last updated 28 May
Associate Professor in Photography Stuart Whipps is exploring the Black Country’s industrial and geological past during a two-month residency at The New Art Gallery Walsall.
Through a new work titled The Formation of the Universe, the BCU academic is connecting the region’s industrial heritage with its much older geological history, encouraging audiences to reconsider the landscapes, materials and histories embedded within the places around them.
“I’m interested in the idea that a piece of limestone, a fossil, a slag heap or a factory can all contain traces of enormous narratives about time, transformation and human activity,” he said.
Based in Birmingham and educated at the University of Wolverhampton, Stuart has long explored the relationship between landscape, industry and memory through his work.
His practice examines how social and industrial histories become embedded within buildings, objects and environments.
“A railway cutting, a quarry or a patch of woodland can suddenly become a place that connects local histories to deep geological time and even global industrial histories,” he said.
“I think the arts can help people connect emotionally to those stories in a way that facts alone sometimes can’t.”
The residency builds on a series of previous projects exploring geology, extraction and industrial change, including A Foot, A Mouth, A Hundred Billion Stars at the Lapworth Museum of Geology and The Expanded Field at Lismore Castle Arts in Ireland.
It also reflects growing awareness of the region’s geological importance since the Black Country was awarded UNESCO Global Geopark status in 2020, recognising the area’s internationally important fossil record and natural heritage.
“The UNESCO designation recognises that the area has geological importance on an international scale,” said Stuart.
“That’s an extraordinary thing, and I don’t think we celebrate it enough.”
The project culminates in a live performance lecture at The New Art Gallery Walsall on 4 July, combining projected images, analogue slides, moving image, objects, live camera feeds and spoken narration.
“A performance lecture sits somewhere between a lecture, a film screening and a live artwork,” explained Stuart.
“It allows me to share research in a way that feels dynamic, unstable and exploratory rather than fixed or authoritative.”
For more information , visit https://thenewartgallerywalsall.org.uk/exhibition/stuart-whipps-the-formation-of-the-universe/