Poet Sean Borodale in residence at Exeter Art Space

As part of TOPOS, an ongoing project by award-winning Exeter-based artist Volkhardt Müller to make and showcase a series of brand new works in response to the city and its populace, the TS Eliot-nominated poet Sean Borodale is artist-in-residence for a period of five days.

From 30 June to 4 July, Sean and Volkhardt will enter into a dialogue to produce a series of pamphlets in response to the city. The work will involve the staging of theatrical moments in the TOPOS space and it will be periodically open to the public – with the option to spectate or to participate.

“TOPOS is home to discussions, experimentation and actions that foster exchange between specialisms and disciplines, and which are accessible to the public,” says Volkhardt. “TOPOS is about making new and pertinent connections between the culture that concerns us all, and the work that artists put towards it.”

The material produced during Sean’s residency will feed into the ongoing process of discovery that TOPOS represents.

“The artists’ residencies at TOPOS leave room for movement but dialogue and responsiveness are what this project stands for: dialogue between specialisms, dialogue towards the city and its people, and dialogue with them,” says Volkhardt. “Sean Borodale is a writer with an artist's mind. There is a literary structure in his proposition, and I am impatient to see how it will evolve and where I will be in relation to it throughout the week.”

Sean Borodale says: “Each day that I spend in TOPOS with Volkhardt will be an unknown act of attention both to the idea of the artist’s space, and to its embeddedness within the sounds, journeys, enigmas that make up the known/unknown city around the artist’s space. I'm interested in the moment the doors open, when people, if they arrive, will bring news and the instruments of their attention as audience and spectators. I know we will have five scripts, five events, five pamphlets. The durations and shapes of those times and materials are as yet a mystery. I don't know what will happen exactly but I'm looking forward to being there.”

TOPOS is open to the public on Thursday 2nd, Friday 3rd and Satruday 4th July, 6-7pm, for a sharing/performance of the material that has been produced so far. People are invited to come along to spectate and/or participate in the process. Check the website for directions: www.toposexeter.uk

Photo credit: Benjamin J Borley