current

dosado – fiona cameron

about the work

This poem encourages you to make looping movements and weave around one another. Leaning into cycles of memory, loss and what is fleeting. This poem is a folded note and a haze of smoke.

The title Dosado is a nod to the folk dancing move Do-si-do which is a French term but often associated with American square dancing, it also has links to a move historically used in some Scottish country dances too.

this iteration of the work also incorporates original directional drawings from a Scottish country dancing book, alongside a qr code which lands at a sound work titled ‘Hoolmyre Dunsinane Hill’

Both the poem and sound work respond to the mist on Dunsinane Hill in Scotland. 

about the artist

Fiona Cameron is an artist and writer based across Teesside & County Durham. Her practice gathers fragments, words, sounds, textures, spaces and pieces them into slow-form assemblages. Sometimes it’s a poem, sometimes a slight disruption, an object altered, a phrase misheard, a rhythm that doesn’t resolve.

Her work moves between the tangible and the ephemeral and often lives in the quiet in-between. Resisting urgency and embracing what is slow, overlooked, or withdrawn. Each gesture, whether held in a poem, a found object or a gathered scrap, is part of an ongoing conversation with transience and care.

This April, she initiated D.L.O (Dead Letter Office) a mail art project and alternative archive that looks to explore what becomes lost, unfinished, or unheard in systems of communication, production, and visibility.

Taking inspiration from alternative networks, and poststructuralist traditions, D.L.O is a slow network of artists, writers, and makers who share rejected ideas, half-finished works, forgotten songs, delayed responses, and found objects through the post. Instead of trading, the network gathers and builds a shared archive of the unmade and the unresolved.

This project seeks to challenge dominant values around productivity, clarity, and completion. It refuses the pressure to produce on demand, to resolve ideas for quick consumption, or to perform constant articulation. Instead, it values things that shift, flicker, and remain in transit. It makes space for those who feel sidelined by institutional systems, and invites a quieter kind of resistance, where being slow, shy, or uncertain is a radical act.

As an artist, Fiona is drawn to what lingers, residual sounds, voices, unspoken thoughts, private hesitations. Her ongoing research asks how quietness can be an active stance. What happens when an idea is never finished?

@fiona.cameron.art
To learn more about the project or to join the D.L.O mail-art network: deadletterofficearchive@gmail.com
Project archive can be found here: www.are.na.com/d-l-o/d-l-o

it’s very simple really. there’s a board attached the gatepost outside the field shelter which sometimes holds a poster to advertise events, but is often empty in-between-times.

we decided it was a space that could be populated with art works in those in-betweens. we’re focusing on text-based art works in this space, as a way to reframe words and poetry in an unexpected location, with the landscape and weather as a backdrop.

many people who pass this space are driving, and so are unlikely to notice a small space like this. however there are many who pass on foot, on their way to the pub, or on a dog-walk; it’s these people who have the time to stop and look, whatever the time of day. text works placed here have an opportunity to provide a moment of contemplation or renewed perspective while going about their daily lives.

particularly in the summer, footfall is high past this spot as holidaymakers and walkers visit the area in their thousands. shield hill, the road on which we are situated, is a direct route between haltwhistle and the roman wall. there is also a large campsite on this road, from which many people walk past on their way to the wall and/or the pub. lots of local people also pass this place when enjoying the burn gorge footpath route, making a loop to return to haltwhistle town.

The format and installation method is an A4, home-printed, laminated sheet – laughably low-tech, and extremely unprofessional.

would you like to see your work here?

text-based artworks are invited to fill this space for a few days or weeks at a time.

• send an email to fieldshelter.arts@gmail.com with your idea
• works can be new or existing, can engage with any theme, and must be your own. The only reason we would reject an artwork is if it’s offensive or plagiarised.
• works must fit onto an A4 page, and can be as ‘designed’ as you like, ie you can just type words onto a document, or you can have other visual elements to accompany the text.
• we’ll invite you to send your work via email. we’ll print and laminate it, then we’ll attach it to the board
• we’ll ask you for a little information about you and your work, and links to your web presence and socials, and we will put these on this page. the qr code on the gatepost leads here.
• right now, this is a volunteer-led, unfunded project which runs on generosity and goodwill. there is no fee for contributions but we will send you something nice in the post as a thank you!

past works

April/May 2025

observe & interact – liz postlethwaite

liz is a community artist and organiser, and permaculture practitioner. She has a particular interest in the way that an open, creative, inclusive process can be used to encourage the development of ecosystems where all species can flourish. She is committed to developing work which explores how we can take inspiration from the natural world that we are part of to create places and spaces where regenerative cultures can thrive.

www.smallthings.org.uk
www.lizpostlethwaite.co.uk
@mudandculture.bsky.social
mudandculture.substack.com/

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March 2025

the moon in your eye and a blade of grass in your hand – 2025 – lydia brockless