Standards for a Revolution and Handstone both speak to Hannah Imlach’s interest in community-initiated renewable energy transition. They are, or depict, objects with nascent energy-generating potential. Energy here, is not just the stuff of charge points and power lines, it represents autonomy, the potential to sustain and nourish a community. We are living through an energy crisis, and it has never been more important to question where we get our energy from and how society provides for those with limited resources.
In 2019, Imlach completed a three-month residency with Peacock in Aberdeen. She divided this time between the print studio and the banks of the River Don, which she walked with members of Aberdeen Community Energy (ACE). Initiated in 2015 by the Donside Community Association, ACE successfully installed an Archimedes’ screw hydroelectric turbine, the UK’s first urban micro-hydro scheme. The helical generator now turns rhythmically on the Don, inputting energy into the grid and becoming a gathering point for community activity. Standards for a Revolution was created in celebration of this community’s tenacity, and as a call for others to join the energy revolution.
In the print studio, Imlach experimented with embossing and relief processes before returning to the medium of screenprint. Despite working in the print studio throughout her undergraduate education, Handstone is Imlach’s first print work since graduating in 2011. Her residency at Peacock provided an opportunity to rediscover this process and revisit research materials generated through her ‘energy projects’ since 2015. The editioned work Handstone depicts a saddle quern photographed on North Uist in 2017, a key symbol of community self-sufficiency. The residency allowed Imlach to bring these objects of research and inspiration into correspondence with her sculptural works. They were exhibited together in a solo show Energy Objects from August to September 2019.
