Exhibition dates: 9 May–31 October 2002

Semaphore image courtesy of Beth Derbyshire. 

This exhibition is no longer on display.

Beth Derbyshire presents a new video artwork for the Museum, with the help of ex-Royal Navy Signaller Chris Rickard and contemporary poet Alison Pryde.

The installation

The work, called You and I, is a semaphore communication between signallers on the rooftops of the Queen's House and the Royal Observatory. One of the messages sent is a haiku poem written specially by Pryde which addresses the themes of departure, navigation and exploration.

Ball code signal apparatus, 1858. Repro ID: E9010-1 ©National Maritime Museum, Greenwich, London. This rare apparatus was used for signalling from ship to ship. The code was designed by Caption Francis Liardet (1798–1863) for use in calm weather when the ordinary signal flags would droop. The signals would be suspended from a wire fixed from the ship's mast to its deck.Visitors encounter the image of one signaller projected life-size on a large screen communicating across the room to another on a far smaller LCD screen. As one signaller transmits the poem the other will be sending the co-ordinates of his location (the Queen's House), effectively sending the message of 'here'.

The artist writes

Box of dummy flares and rockets, made by Schermuly of Newdigate, Surrey, England. Repro ID: E8942 ©National Maritime Museum, Greenwich, LondonA medium which is associated with the constraints of officialdom is used to send a message which is associated with the freedom of the pursuit of enlightenment. Both are forms of an essential, reduced expression that relies on rigid formal structures. The movement of the signaller's flags through the air tracing shapes that become part of a video drawing… An automatic dialogue is opened as one signaller communicates about the possibility of travel from his position, whilst the other re-stating his position of "here" over and over, continually reminding us that to depart and navigate from anywhere there has to be a starting point. A parallel can be drawn to the coast, as a place of departures and arrivals.

Interpretation

The Eighth Wonder of the World. The Atlantic Cable, 19th century, published by Kimmel & Forster. Repro ID: PX8263 ©National Maritime Museum, Greenwich, LondonFor the exhibition the Museum will produce postcard sized reprints of a semaphore chart from the collections. Visitors can use this to decode the messages, passing silently across the room, and take the card home as a memento of the work. The artist along with Barnaby Drabble, project curator, are also preparing a small display on semaphore for the ante-rooms to the South West parlour. This will include objects and manuscripts from the Museum's collection and preparatory works by the artist.

Elastic Distances and the Far & Near

The Steamship Great Eastern laying the first successful Atlantic cable, by Henry Clifford, 1865. Repro ID: BHC3380 ©National Maritime Museum, Greenwich, LondonThrough global communication systems and travel, people and places take on a telescopic nature. Distances become elastic in the sense that the far can become near and vice versa.
Beth Derbyshire

The Emigrants, by James Tissot, 1880. Repro ID: B9460 ©National Maritime Museum, Greenwich, LondonThe artist along with Barnaby Drabble, project curator, has also prepared a small display, Elastic Distances and the Far & Near, in the Queen's House. Elastic Distances addresses the themes of communication and travel. It contains objects and images from the Museum's collection, selected by the artist to help us understand the references to flight and distance, which are explored in her video installation, You and I.