Ghosts of the Restless Shore

Ghosts of the Restless Shore Exhibition at The Atkinson Gallery, Southport

The exhibition ‘Ghosts of the Restless Shore’ ran from 15th August to the 15th November 2015 at the Atkinson gallery in Southport.

It was curated by Mike Collier of WALK (Walking Art Landskip and Knowledge) and included work produced over a year following the ‘Walking Through the Sands of Time’ series of ‘meanders’ with the public that took place over the summer of 2014 along the 22.5 miles of the Sefton Coast Path.

Following the series of walks, the artists and John Dempsey (natural historian) kept in touch and continued to meet. A subsequent visit to see Geraldine Reid, Head of the Botany Department at the World Museum in Liverpool, was crucial in bringing together many thoughts surrounding the relationship between art and science. A number of seminars were held in which Stephen Whittle and Jane Brown from the Atkinson Gallery along with the artists and John Dempsey, discussed how the work could form the basis of an ambitious show.

The resulting exhibition displayed work produced both collaboratively and individually by the artists in response to the extraordinary variety of social, cultural and natural history of the Sefton Coast. It also included original herbarium sheets loaned from the World Museum, Liverpool, which were instrumental in inspiring a number of pieces.

The exhibition was made possible by funds from the University of Sunderland, WALK, Sefton Council, the Sefton Coast Partnership, the Arts Council of England, the University of Liverpool, the Atkinson and Arts Editions North.

If you are interested in showing this exhibition, please contact Mike Collier.