Treasure Hunt

Where are the most isolated places in Derbyshire?

This the question we began to ask ourselves.  What do we call isolated?  What do other people think is isolated?  How do we know where to take the museum?  What do we mean by isolated?  Is it culturally or physically or is it both?  How can we work this one out?

Sally L had heard about a conference that was all about art in rural places, specifically in Derbyshire.  The event was part of Re:place and lots of artists that work and live in Rural spaces would be there.  Perhaps we could ask them? They perhaps have a better understanding than us?...  

We decided it would be much more fun to create a piece of work that would invite interaction from the people at the conference.  That's just how we do things.  So, we devised a little game of Treasure Hunt. A map of Derbyshire made of cloth and full of sand, flags with labels to put into it and a collection of pens to write on the flags. But no prizes, which was a bit unusual for us.

We got ready, costumes as usual.  We decided on a tweedy looking affair with hats, jackets and shirts.  Sally L made a lovely tweed skirt to go with her jacket and really looked like a lady of the country.

We trollied up with our bag of sand, fabric map and flags.  Set up the whole thing on a table in the Gothic warehouse, Cromford Wharf.  As people arrived we asked them to take part in the activity.  It was more difficult to get these people to help than it was the general public- perhaps a prize would have been a good idea.  We didn't think they would need it...

In all we collected 23 flags with various places listed, some villages, and others just woods, rocks and various geological features rather than places we could visit.

So, what did we think about all of this?  Well, firstly that we should have been more specific in our questions about 'places'.  We were looking for isolated places were people might live or be, rather than a geological feature.  So we needed to define what we meant by 'place'.  The other very noticeable thing was that for a group of people who has come to talk about what it was to produce art in rural spaces, specifically Derbyshire, and a group that contained people from out of the area that had been paid to produce art works in Derbyshire, it was incredible how they all commented on the difficulty of the task!  Does anyone know about isolated places in Derbyshire.

We thought we might ask the people on the street for an answer- perhaps they would have a better idea of isolated places in the county.