Epoche: withholding of assent. 2022

Site-specific installation by Artist Su Nicholls

at Hungate Medieval Art, St. Peters Hungate Princes Street, Norwich NR3 1AE by

Install by Su Nicholls & Alan Powley

Epoche: withholding of assent is a site-specific work that conjures ideals of light and space whilst displaying embodied tension within the twine structure.

Designed to blend and co-operate, the installation intends to celebrate the serenity of the space within this magnificent building.

During these past months, nature has reclaimed spaces, enjoying a quieter time uninterrupted by comings and goings.

The work is inspired by an extraordinary spider’s web found in the entrance porch at Hungate. This beautiful snare combines delicate intricacies and immense strength, and in this combination, echoes the structure that houses it.

Inter-twining, without overwhelming, this installation can be read and interpreted by visitors in their own way.

Spoken word performed at PV

Building my lair, listening to the sounds of the city

the rushing & bustling, the quiet, the calm, the shouts, the screams, the whispers, the rings, the bells, the demands, the calls

Building my lair, my comfort, my safe-place, my trap, my beautiful trap,

my safe-place, my quiet place, my serene place, angelic, graceful, beautiful, glorious

my safe-place, my creative space, my making place, my busy place, my free place, my place of freedom, strange it’s in a church?

So full of dilemmas, demands, power, rules, chapters, verses, hymns, prayers, levies, payments, financial obligations buying your way to heaven, heaven or hell?

Up or down? Down or up?

What are you buying? An excuse for past? But you’re buying it whilst still doing those vile bad things, those sins, you are just excusing yourself morally un-corrupting yourself being forgiven in life so you sleep well in your feathered bed

But I’m building a lair, a lair of conscience, what are we doing to this world? Why did that spider build that beautiful web in the entrance to a beautiful building, untouched

untouched while we all hid at home in fear, left to wave in the wind, so fine, so very fragile, and yet so immensely strong, Like a Brunnell bridge, woven from silk the spider’s lair, the spider’s hammock, the spider’s place,

its home, its safety, its lair, its trap beautifully revealed, by the dew in the morning, and the dust from the roads, and the busy

glistening in the morning sunshine, glistening silken threads, beautiful, ethereal, and yet so very fragile, and so very strong

woven almost like a blanket, comforting soft blanket, and yet we return from our hiding, and the busy-ness of life removes that beautiful spider’s web, that web woven over who knows how long? who knows by which spider? was it a mother spider with babies? was it a lone spider? was it a group of spiders?

Coming back to reclaim the space because it’s quiet at last, the quieter life, nature returning back into spaces, dominating them, recovering them, and here we have a glorious lair, a giant hammock.