Convened under November’s Dark Moon, Rudimentary Rhythms was the culmination of Cherry Truluck’s residency in Delfina Foundation’s Politics of Food programme. The event launched THE ANIMIST ALMANAC, a six-year programme of arts-based research and practice initiated by artist Cherry Truluck around oat cultivation and fugitive temporalities.

This evening gathering commenced with an oat-sowing ritual, collectively performed in a sonic landscape developed in collaboration with sound artist Helga Mendes daFonseca (Feralchild). Under the full moon, guests were invited to plant seeds, grown by Cherry herself, in earth taken from the ground in Somerset where they were first nourished; completing one growth cycle and beginning another. This ritual was followed by a feast celebrating oats, created in collaboration with chef Grace Gibbons (Spring, Maremma, Kitchen W8).

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Each day you replicate the rhythms of your ancestors,
the molecular pulsing of enzymes,
the drubbing beat of carbon being metabolised
resounds through your circadian pathway.
Through iterative cycles, you forge a memory that spans generations, 

In your cadences you have re-membered territories
you have found resonance and reciprocity. 
Your rhythmic expression trembles the water of the river and
the water becomes your memory too.
From Rudimentary Rhythms

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“The past is never left behind, never finished once and for all, and the future is not what will come to be in an unfolding of the present moment; rather the past and the future are enfolded participants in matter’s iterative becoming. Becoming is not an unfolding in time, but the inexhaustible dynamism of the enfolding of mattering.” (Karen Barad, 2007)

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EVENT CREDITS

The Animist Almanac is a core element of Cherry Truluck’s doctoral research with UK Food Systems CDT and the Institute of Biological, Environmental and Rural Sciences in Aberystwyth. It is part of Seeding the Commons, a programme of work by Custom Food Lab in partnership with the Gaia Foundation and supported by Arts Council England.

POLITICS OF FOOD

This event was part of the public programme of Delfina Foundation’s fifth season of the Politics of Food, in partnership with Gaia Art Foundation and with additional support from a range of individuals and partners.

GALLERY

Photography by Anne Tetzlaff