Semantic Geology was a one night event in the village of Soudley, Forest of Dean. Commissioned by Gloucester council for the arts event, Encantas.

The project was the combination of audio and video sourced from the Dean Heritage Museum archive and material recorded during a residency through the Forest of Dean Sculpture Trust.

Sampling, processing and refining the material produced in two aspects of the project. Firstly three independent audio works which ran through-out the event. Each representing one of the physical, historical and social aspects of the community. They were composed to act as independent products and simultaneously as components of a whole audio work. They were installed in three locations around the recreation ground in Soudley village.

The second aspect of the work is a silent video work, also derived from the same archive materials resulting in a historical and contemporary moving image interpretation of the Forest of Dean, which was presented in the Village hall.

The audio and video were united through the use of a radio broadcast live from the recreation ground. The three audio works were combined with live interaction with the audience on the night and with spoken word by Dave Harvey, a local poet and spoken word artist. These elements were channelled into 1 signal and sent via a phone line to the Forest of Dean radio station in Cinderford, where it was broadcast across the whole of the forest.

In the hall, as the silent film was projected a series of radios were tuned to the Forest radio broadcast (1503 – 1521 AM), which provide the soundtrack for the footage.

semantic geology