Low Points by Martha Cattell features drawing and handsewn flag.
Martha is an artist, researcher and film programmer, whose work largely explores ecologically haunted places.
“You can probably answer the question, what is the highest point in Britain? Probably a number of the highest points in fact. But a question you probably are unable to answer, is what is the lowest point in Britain? Answer: Holme, Cambridgeshire (pronounced home) a small Fenland village where I grew up, just down the road from this exhibition.
The lowest point specifically is believed to be marked by two iron posts (The Holme Fen Posts) which stand just outside the village. These posts came about to mark shrinkage, after a group of male landowners drained Whittlesea Mere in 1848, for agricultural land. The posts not only mark the lowest point in Britain, but highlight a landscape that has been altered and contained for hundreds of years.
This work is part of a continued exploration of what it means to live in/visit the lowest point in Britain, mentally and physically and a landscape haunted by alterations for profit and revertion as water levels rise. The drawings are taken from an upcoming zine and the flag specifically is responding to the flag that was flown after the drainage of Whittlesea Mere which stated: ‘See proudly floats our flag on high, O’er wastes by history renowned. All Hail! The Mere at length is dry. Success had perseverance crowned.”