I’ve been repairing my sound walk, No Birds Land, in the Trinity Tunnel of the Edinburgh cycle paths.
Tomorrow morning there’s a community walk along the Trinity Path where it’s situated and I’m going to say a bit about how I made it and why, play it to them, encourage participants to Stop and Listen to the Birds, and put the installation into the context of the tunnel, the old railway, and the history of the area.
It’s a wet and mucky job as the rain comes in and runs down the walls, bringing with it all sorts of minerals and deposits in a wonderful array of subtle and extreme colours. The there are the mosses and lichen, spiders and flies, and lots of tiny feathers embedded there too.
Mosses and minerals inside the Trinity Tunnel, Edinburgh The wet walls of the Trinity Tunnel, site of No Birds Land
As well as the pleasure of working in this environment and discovering the little messages and additions folk leave or add, it’s the interaction with the walkers, runners and cyclists I enjoy.
The first man stopped running and asked about what I was doing. He shared his experiences of going from light to darkness, activated the QR code, and thanked me.
Another woman kept running but called she called out, “That looks lovely!”
I offered a card to a couple of guys sheltering under umbrellas, who said “Yes please”. Then one said he’d already listened on a previous occasion and smiled.
Keith – he told me his name: – stopped and used the QR code (his son had told him about the ones along the Water of Leith). He asked me if it was the same sort of thing and I explained. “Nice to meet you”, he said, asking my name, and walked off, listening, so that my recorded Sound Poem rang out in the #trinitytunnel
A huge white, wet, fluffy dog barked and barked. I like to think he was v enthusiastic about No Birds Land as a work of public and activist art!
Sadly, someone has stolen the sign from the south end of the Trinity Tunnel #edinburgh Local graffiti on the opposite wall of the Trinity Tunnel, Edinburgh
If you’d like to join us, here are the details: Join the Drylaw Neighbourhood Monday Morning Walking Group and me for a tour on 28th July of the Trinity Path. You will learn about and listen to the No Birds Land soundwalk (funded by RSPB and Sustrans, shortlisted for a Sound Walk September Award) and Trinity area local history.
Either meet at Drylaw Neighbourhood Centre (DNC) at 10am (free return bus) or at the path entrance on Trinity Rd near the junction with Lower Granton Road. What3Words ///since.page.tells at 10.45am.
Ends approx. 12.15 at Trinity / back at DNC by 1pm.
Bring a pack lunch and drink if you like, plus something to sit on and keep you dry in the event of showers.
1 November 2024 a Walking the Land artist collective monthly event. This Friday’s brief was by Janette Kerr and me, Tamsin Grainger and part of the Lines of Enquiry, a collective walking art project which will culminate in a group exhibition in 2025.
Look for somewhere to sit, stand or crouch on your own. Pause. Close your eyes and concentrate on listening.
Try to separate out all the sounds you can hear.
Using a piece of paper and pencil, crayon or pen, and with your eyes still closed, make marks on your paper that you think might represent the sounds you are hearing (don’t try to make a picture of, or draw, the thing making the noise!)
Spend as long as you like doing this. You might stop and do it several times during the walk.
If you are walking with others, you might try this together on one piece of paper.
Here are the What3Words locations for the 6 stops we made along part of the Edinburgh Cycle Path network, connecting in spirit with others who were walking along the Honeybourne Line (Gloucestershire) and elsewhere.
///Causes.Host.Home
///Perky.Fetch.Useful
///Notice.Case.Bugs
///Linked.Tides.Eager
///Bounty.Belong.Only
///Maker.Exit.Corn
///Friday.Notice.Retail
Damp earth causes stains Tree hosts magpies and sparrows Home is far away.
Wet bottoms as we drew the sounds around us with our eyes closed Sometimes using two hands as the sound came from so many places. Photo Janette Kerr
Perky dog's tail wags 'Fetch' calls his human with joy Useful happinness.
Part of the No Birds Land sound walk installationUnder the Bridge. Edinburgh cycle paths. Photo Janette Kerr
Notice how cold stone Is, in case of chills and piles Bugs me every time.
A sound walk and installation made in a tunnel for ‘Watch This Space’ #4WCoP23 September 2023 using graffiti by North Edinburgh artists and local history. Listen here.
Hand stitched pennants in the Ferry Road Tunnel on the Chancelot Path. Is There a Place for REVOlution? or Peace and Biscuits
Location
‘Is There a Place for REVOlution? or Peace and Biscuits’ is a site-specific Sound Walk and Art Installation on the Chancelot cycle path under Ferry Road in Edinburgh. It is on Google Maps and the location using What3Words is ///fallen.reach.bottle
You can use your phone to activate the QR code and listen while you walk through the tunnel. You can also listen at home (without the full effect).
Understanding the text
The text of this Sound Walk uses other people’s sprayed graffiti words, so it sometimes sounds like nonsense. In it, I am playing with the found text, trying to make sense of it. Sometimes I read the words (like ABDO or REVO) from left to right (as English) and sometimes from right to left (as Arabic), highlighting the effort we often have to make to understand each other, and how important it is that we do. Because this is a sort of creative prose or poetry, I also make up my own words to fit in with the letters I find.
Sound Walk topics include:
Local history
Communication between us (reading and language)
How to keep yourself going when everything seems bleak
How the Red Line has been used in activism, in this and other countries
The capitalist system and whether it helps us
Slowing down and noticing nature; using wall- or street-wisdom
Site-specific Art Installation
You will find hand stitched pennants looped on a red line on one side of the tunnel. The string of triangular flags are hanging from old metal hooks which were originally used for cable and wires when this cycle path (or greenway) was a railway. The images and found text are from the walls and surfaces around North Edinburgh.
#4WCoP23 Is There a Place for REVOlution? or Peace and Biscuits
“AET REY NOOD Do you recognise this language? DAERB REY TAE. Can an internet app translate it? It’s ABout DOing / Or Don’t Be And (face the consequences).” This is text from the new Sound Walk. For clues, see the images below.
Doon Yer Tea, graffiti on the North Edinburgh cycle paths. Is There a Place for REVOlution? or Peace and Biscuits
I’m playing with words, making my own acronyms which are inspired by the found text. For example, ABDO (reading from left to right and back again from right to left etc) becomes: “And Between Doing Or Don’t Be. Anyway, By Doing Otherwise, Deciding to Be And Bide, Doesn’t Our Doing Become……A Beautiful Door Opening. Or Don’t Butterflies Ascend?” Am I speaking in riddles? I hope I haven’t lost you.
ABDO, graffiti in the Ferry Road Tunnel of the Chancelot Path. Is There a Place for REVOlution? or Peace and Biscuits
Is There a Place for REVOlution or Peace and Biscuits mini-videoREVO and BISTO, two of the most familiar ‘words’ of graffiti found in the Ferry Road tunnel of the Chancelot Path. Is There a Place for REVOlution? ABDO (reading from right to left: ODBA) is a character in Egyptian writer, Deena Mohammed’s Your Wish is my Command, a graphic novel. Is There a Place for REVOlution? or Peace and Biscuits
Using found words / graffiti that spoke to me
Unless you people see signs and wonders you will never believe
80% of ocean life is dead
Many
Deaths
Lives Matter
Unfuck the system
Fight
REVOlution, Revolt, Revoke
Part of the Peace and Biscuits sound walk script
Postcard made for the 4th World Congress of Psychogeography 2023. Is There a Place for REVOlution? or Peace and Biscuits
In this soundwalk, there’s some local history, activism and suggestions for when you are in a dark tunnel and cannot see the light at the end, the way out. There’s a film here on Vimeo that gives you a (silent) idea of the walk.
Walking across the Red Line . The Red Line is a symbol that a line has been reached and should not be crossed. An example of this would be the amount of carbon emitted into into our atmosphere. Is There a Place for REVOlution? or Peace and Biscuits
“I often use Street Wisdom if I need to get an insight on a situation or a problem. Once I’m tuned up, I’II hold the issue and just walk with that in mind and body, and see what happens. (It’s basically a shorthand way of doing the Quest: “Streets, show me some options with all this!”) Something often, if not I j. The other day I was full of different stresses, and the streets shared with me all kinds of patterns that seemed interconnected. I interpreted that insight as “Everything’s connected” (it’s nice to reduce the insight to 2 or 3 words). And that really helped!
Local graffiti Edinburgh. Is There a Place for REVOlution? or Peace and BiscuitsHand stitched pennant. Is There a Place for REVOlution? or Peace and Biscuits
With MANY thanks to Alba Bersolí (film maker ‘El día que volaron la montaña’ (When the Mountain Rumbles shown at the Catalan Film Festival in Edinburgh 2023 on Instagram @albabresolí ) for lending me her laptop and teaching me some Premiere Pro, going above and beyond to support me, and being an all-round wonderful woman.
New pennants (August 2025)
Notes
‘Your Wish is my Command’ is a graphic novel by Deena Mohamed reviewed here in the Guardian newspaper. There is a charcter called Abdo in it. ABDO is a word graffitied on the wall of the Ferry Road tunnel on the Chancelot Path where my Sound Walk is located.
Walking without a donkey 