Hindlow Quarry reveals land art

Eddy Dreadnought, a contemporary artist, has created a 75 m long piece of Land Art at Tarmac’s Hindlow Quarry, near Buxton.

An explanatory sign gives details as to the inspiration behind the artwork and can be viewed from the bridleway south of Hindlow Quarry. It overlooks the land ‘drawings’ that are visible in the dormant quarry bottom. The art was created by scraping the compressed and weathered quarry floor to reveal lighter limestone fragments underneath.

The shape of the giant drawing is derived from the pattern of the temporary rails that were used by stone pickers to wheel hand-wagons filled with fresh limestone from the quarry face. Such rails were used in the quarry until the 1950s.

Eddy Dreadnought said: “This was a really interesting project in which through art we have been able to capture the industrial heritage of this important quarrying area.”

Andy Flanagan, Manager at Tarmac’s Hindlow Quarry said: “There has been a great deal of local interest into this project and it is fantastic to have the signage in place explaining the history and background to the project. I would like to thank Eddy for his excellent work in reflecting the history of the quarry in such a visual way.”

Eddy Dreadnought took his inspiration from Graham Sutherland, who in 1943 was sent to Hindlow Quarry, then owned by ICI, to document its war effort. The drawings that Sutherland made are mainly in the Imperial War Museum, with some in Newcastle, the British Council Collection and Sheffield.In summer 2014, Eddy Dreadnought became Artist in Residence at Tarmac’s nearby Tunstead quarry, the largest European limestone quarry, but also worked extensively at Hindlow.

During this time, he produced nine ‘calcified’ drawings of Tunstead using mixed media, but all containing chalk paint and some milk of lime. More recently, Eddy has completed a DVD called ‘Hindlow’ which features footage of Sutherland at work and footage of Eddy’s work on creating the land art. He also made a second film ‘Tunstead’, which is a documentary of the modern quarry.

Adapted from press release by Rebecca Bowden

Read the article online at: https://www.worldcement.com/europe-cis/31082016/hindlow-quarry-reveals-land-art-167/