Jwllrs takes us inside a memorable night where local food and art come together.
Under the gales of Storm Amy, 40 dinner guests arrive at Morecambe Sailing Club’s clubhouse. They arrive in response to a mysterious invitation to SEED: a five course meal served by local and international artists, hosted by Jwllrs (pronounced like ‘jewellers’). They enter a blustery doorway to a dimly-lit room, where they receive a glass of locally-foraged rosehip or elderberry and sloe cordial by Amy Dickson, and find somewhere to sit. The clubhouse, what looks like an old working men’s club decked with nautical decorations, has a variety of tables spread across the hardwood floor, with additional speakers, projectors, and a portable projector screen suggesting some audio-visual elements.
SEED was developed to catalyse food/art collaborations in the Morecambe Bay area. The project centred around a dinner of food-related performances/experiences, from Abigail Hampsey, Alistair Debling, Jamie Jenkinson, Nandal Seo, and On Yee Lo, under the umbrella of Jwllrs, an alternative art school based in Morecambe. On the evening of SEED, guests arrived from various local organisations and/or with practices associated to food and/or art. A dimly-lit room with a sit-anywhere seating plan and locally-foraged drinks set the tone of the evening.
From the kitchen, On Yee — a London-based Hong Konger — opened the event with O Hemiola. On Yee’s increasingly hectic performance of measuring, heating, and mixing soya milk and coagulants, while keeping a gong ringing, highlights themes of time keeping, labour, and choreography of the body in the kitchen. The performance ended with the spectacle of pouring the mixture into a large pan, reminiscent of her mother’s cooking. The pan remained in place, as attention was shifted to biscuits arriving on small silver plates.
Traditional funeral biscuits were given out in differing sizes, shapes and quantities, some guests receiving a mound, others none. Abi — a Lancaster-based artist, and the energy behind local food businesses Born and Bread and Marra — began a reading. Lucky Dip expands cultural histories and social inequality through biscuits, as Abi encouraged guests without biscuits to ‘steal’ from those with an abundance. Abi’s Busman’s Holiday featuring bread cairns was one of the first exhibitions we held at Jwllrs in 2023, and our first food-related project.
For the next course, trays of prepared ingredients were brought out. We KNEED to Talk, by Nandal — a London-based South Korean artist — introduces locally-grown dumpling ingredients from Claver Hill, through the lens of migratory routes, and their cultural significance. Each guest has a small map and table to fill in, and Nandal loosely leads guests to roll, fill and close their own dumplings, then to name and label them before they’re taken to be steamed.
Trays of ceramic oyster shells on crushed ice arrive, each with a scoop of lapsang souchong and nettle kombucha sorbet (made at Morecambe’s Miogelato). Jamie — a Morecambe-based artist and co-lead at Jwllrs — read quotes about culture, Britain’s nuclear weapons tests, Morecambe geology, and nettles, alongside projected 35mm slides of dried kombucha SCOBY (the yeasty pancake that sits on kombucha and makes it ferment), that resemble desert landscapes. Terra considered class, culture, and colonial perceptions. After a short break, the steamed dumplings and their notes were given out randomly.
Drawn back to the kitchen, Alister — an Ulverston-based artist and chef — presented Nastja & Nastja: Old Polish Traditions in the Kitchen and at the Table, a drag cabaret about a romance turned violent. Murdered heads of cabbage and ripped-out SCOBY hearts were chopped, minced, and piped into a vape-smoked-sausage-condom, for a large pot of vegan Bigos (mimicking a traditional polish meat stew). A previously cooked version was brought out and served. Followed by the final course of On Yee’s silken tofu and ginger syrup, now congealed, and served as dessert.
The morning after, a workshop for artists and guests was hosted by Morecambe-based artist and Jwllrs co-lead, Amy Dickson; and London-based Chinese designer, Can Yang. elaborating on food sources and using leftover food waste for pigments and printing; and followed by a panel discussion accompanied by a pot of soup with the remaining leftovers. The material from the workshop, discussion, event, and feedback from the night, have supported this publication, designed by Can.
The intention of SEED is to inspire, evidence, and showcase the potential of bringing art and food together. becoming a catalyst for guests with practices or connections to food to continue these exchanges in the region. North Lancashire is culturally rich, but lacks conventional arts infrastructure, often centralised to financially wealthy areas. By working with existing infrastructure, such as the wealth of exciting food production, with a critical and contemporary rigour, a more expanded and exciting idea of creative and sustaining projects could be achieved in the region. With the potential of Morecambe establishing a culture of exciting food experiences.
Jwllrs is co-ran by Jamie Jenkinson and Amy Dickson. Follow this link to take a look at the Jwllrs publication arising from the project.
