Hermit Day and walking
Sunday October 29th, is known as Hermit Day, devoted to Hermits and celebrating Solitude as what complements our lives, full of constant social interactions.
The word “hermit” may invokes images of physically isolated individuals, and often envisioned as strange or odd. However, even in our ever busy lives, there are moments where we want to escape from the world, even if it is only temporary. And often we forget the importance of just being.
The word “hermit” derives from the Greek word Erėmos, which means solitary. And one of the first places that may come to mind that reflects this state of being are libraries. Solitude is something we often search for as we turn to a good book in a moment in between. A book is the perfect place to lose oneself and find respite from chaos and routine of everyday life. Reading as a completely solitary adventure.
In Renaissance libraries were often designed as studiolos, a studiolo was a place to retire, a large wooden structure, like an indoor hut for reading, placed in the house of a scholar, integrating a desk, a library, but also a meeting space for conversations with friends, with books at hand. It was depicted marvelously by Antonello da Messina, in his painting of St Jerome in His Studiolo, painted as a space in between indoors and outdoors, St Jerome writing in his study encircled by animals and birds.
Some of literature’s greatest poets and authors were hermits. Emily Dickinson did not leave her Massachusetts home once for the last seventeen years of her life, and much of her writing is introspective and reflective. Ralph Waldo Emerson believed strongly in the power of solitude, and wrote three essays, Society and Solitude, Self-Reliance, and Nature. Not in the least was Henry David Thoreau, who wrote Walden while alone in his cabin on Walden Pond. And all of them found inspiration for their solitary writing while walking, in nature and in the mind.
Don’t forget to check out our book page on WLC.
Complementary to reading a book, it may be the right day to join our Walking Detective Meet Up today, uncovering forgotten or not yet revealed walking art practices, welcoming as well your suggestions and discoveries of what is hidden and unknown about walking art.
See you there.
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New walking pieces
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At a geographic and geologic boundary, hikers symbolically disable their vehicles. The rubber wheels are then used to first draw, then erase, a mountain snowcap or glacier. Melting “waters” tumble joyously downhill. Keep reading
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The Stranger is a performance, an object, a walking piece, and a system of facilitating self discovery using the landscape and the objects around it. Keep reading
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Lydia Kennaway reads selected poems from her book, ‘A History of Walking’. Keep reading
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The Chain Coral Chorus is a Geopoetic research project that explores the connections and clashes between walking, geology and place-identity, creating poems, essays and field notes inspired by and set in the UNESCO Black Country Geopark. Keep reading
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Dr. Chris Omni's doctoral research on Black Joy in Green Spaces is now presented as a walking art performance that encourages Black women to prioritize rest. This piece is filmed in a way that poetically invites audiences to walk in the shoes of BW. Keep reading
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A 365 day walk around the whole of Britain, which connected with walking artists along the way. Keep reading
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This project explores how we can create new geographies of the mind by collaboratively exploring our local environments slowly, at a very small scale, and by hand rather than on foot. Working together, artists Chris Kaczmarek and Deirdre Macleod each recorded, using Whatsapp, a sequence of concurrent haptic walks in wh... Keep reading
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Guided walks for school children in a patch of old-growth boreal forest in Newfoundland, Canada, with readings of site-specific poetry, followed by the children drawing memory maps of their walk. Keep reading
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Roll out this walk thru version of Ralph Hoyte's Colston’s Last Journey work of soundart about Bristol and the Transatlantic Trafficking of Enslaved Africans anywhere in the world (iPhone; we're getting there for Android). For further info and to experience the work search colstonslastjourney.uk and follow the link to ... Keep reading
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You never know when another woman will see you, understand you and make you do what
you're supposed to do whether you like it or not. Wendy is undaunted by Noreen's whining
and bad habits and gets her up and moving. Keep reading
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Upcoming events
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2023-10-30 20:30
· Online
Help us uncover the forgotten or not yet revealed walking compositions. Keep reading
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2023-10-30 13:00
· 16 Brushfield St, London E1 6AT, UK
Join Urszula Caroto (LinkedIn) for a 1-hour in-person Street Wisdom Walkshop in London, UK on 30th October 2023, meeting at the Herd of Hope Elephant at Spitafields... Keep reading
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2023-11-02 18:00
· Forest of Dean District, UK
The concept is to find inspiration in nature during a friendly artist led woodland walk with like minded others and then to develop ideas into a finished piece of a... Keep reading
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2023-11-03 09:00
· Canberra ACT, Australia
Come and explore Canberra’s heritage listed, 100-year-old Cork Forest. Join a cohort of Localjinni’s as we throw light on this enchanted wood, make walking drawings... Keep reading
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2023-11-03 15:00
· NDSM-Plein 28, 1033 WB Amsterdam, Netherlands
Join Nadia von Holzen (LinkedIn) from Learning Moments and Mirjam Leunissen (LinkedIn) for a 2-hour in-person Street Wisdom Walkshop in Amsterdam on Friday 3rd Nove... Keep reading
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2023-11-05 13:00
· Boisdale, Isle of South Uist, UK
This 40-minute soundwalk combines readings of Ely’s poem Orasaigh with original compositions and soundscapes captured in surround sound that is mapped to a coastal ... Keep reading
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From our network
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As part of the release of the hardcover release of my book, Walking as Artistic Practice (softcover comes out in April!), I’m going to be publishing some brief inte... Keep reading
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Josh Allen untangles Walk Midlands: his COVID-born, politically-led, history-fuelled, trans-regional walking project, that is a no-cars-required walking guide to th... Keep reading
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Day 120 - Scheculed and 1.6 km drawing. Keep reading
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July 2023 Backpacking Nowadays, I travel overland. This is a personal choice based on the disastrous climate situation in which we know, absolutely, that air travel... Keep reading
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Day 118 - Monumental and 1.2 km drawing.Puma concolor and 1.2 km drawing. Keep reading
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A twin-porpoise trip to Shrewsbury, both fulfilled.
Firstly, a trip to the world's first iron-framed building, and a trip up its smashing tower. Some pictures ... Keep reading
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Day 117 - Practice and 2.3 km drawing. Decompress and 1.5 km drawing. Keep reading
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Angela Reinders is based in Aachen, in Germany, and recently used Dérive app, the mobile app by Babak Fakhamzadeh which helps to get you lost, as part of a liturgic... Keep reading
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After a long break, I am making another tour and it will get its first outing next month in Shenzhen. I will try to make it as bad a tour as possible from the conte... Keep reading
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Day 115 - Familiarity and 1.5 km drawing. Decompress and 1.4 km drawing. Keep reading
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L’automne s’enfuit, doucementGlissant vers l’hiver, inéluctableLes passereaux se sont tusLes corneilles persistent, résistentEt même bavardent de plus belleDe cris ... Keep reading
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Stuff we found
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A new film adaptation of his 1967 essay “The Society of the Spectacle” reminds us that the revolution must take place within the self first. Source: 50 Years Later,... Keep reading
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