Phil Smith, known for creating performance walks from Kensington Gardens to rocky North Devon promontories, from long Cornish beaches to Ipswich’s suburbia via Sussex re-wilding sites, created this instant mis-guided tour of a few streets in Llandudno, looking at the secret history of apparently innocent signage, the mysterious journeys of materials and the way that myths are waiting to give meaning to even the most ordinary of places.
On 22nd November, 2017, Phil took 15 of us on this mis-guided tour, as the closing event for Lindsey Colbourne's 'O Fa'ma i Fa'ma: A People's Map of Llandudno' residency at Culture Action Llandudno.
Now you can try out this way of experiencing a place.... The wander starts at Oriel Mostyn Gallery, Lady Augusta Mostyn's aspired-for new centre of town, and ends at Y Tabernacl, at the heart of the old town. Time takes some strange twists and turns along the way. You will see some photos of us on the same wander, now added to the sediment of semi-forgotten history of Llandudno.
Phil Smith is a performance-maker, writer and ambulatory researcher, specialising in creating performances related to walking, site-specificity, and counter-tourism. He is a core member of site-based arts collective Wrights & Sites, presently working on a new publication: ‘The Architect-Walker’. He is also developing a ‘common dance for threatened subjectivities’ with choreographer Melanie Kloetzel (Calgary University) and is working as a Site Artist for Tracing the Pathway’s ‘Groundwork’ project in Milton Keynes.Phil’s publications include ‘Anywhere’ (2017), ‘On Walking’ and ‘Enchanted Things’ (2014), ‘Counter-Tourism: The Handbook’ (2012) and ‘Mythogeography’ (2010). He is an Associate Professor (Reader) at Plymouth University.
More about Phil: http://www.triarchypress.net/smithereens.html