Island in a River (2024)

Permanent Exhibition, Yarm, England

Island in a River is a new, permanent exhibition created by Matthew Rosier and produced by Mediale for the newly refurbished Yarm Town Hall Heritage Centre in Stockton on Tees.

Celebrating Yarm’s ancient connection to the River Tees and location on the horseshoe bend of the river, the exhibition features a collection of local artefacts interpreted by ten films, created by the artist in close collaboration with around 100 local residents.

Objects

Working with the local community over two years, Matthew helped curate and co-create a series of objects that the exhibition was built around.

These included a Yarm veteran having his nose cast in silver by silversmith Pete Musson, in tribute to local hero Tom Brown, who lost part of his nose in battle. Another was a lion statue from the legendary nightclub Tall Trees, a mecca for clubbers from across the UK in the 1980s and 90s.

The objects are displayed inside the exhibition’s centrepiece: a replica Iron Age canoe, carved by local volunteers through summer 2023 from a washed-up tree. It was inspired by a prehistoric canoe found, and later lost, 150 years ago, thought to be the earliest evidence of people in the town.

Films

In response to these objects, Matthew worked with local residents to create a series of short films accompanying each exhibit, honouring the town’s historic relationship with the river and the objects, people and memories that have flowed from it.

A replica of a 10th-century Viking helmet, the first Viking helmet ever found in Britain, is accompanied by a film with Ken Parkinson, now in his 80s. As a navvy digging a new drain off Yarm High Street in the 1950s, he rescued the rare artefact from being thrown away as rubbish.

A ceremonial sword owned by former Lord of the Manor Thomas Meynell marks a contemporary reenactment of a moment in railway history. In 1821, Meynell chaired a meeting of railway pioneers at the George and Dragon pub in Yarm, which led to the founding of the Stockton and Darlington Railway, the world’s first public steam railway. In the film, an all-female cast of local community leaders and activists takes the place of the original all-male dignitaries.

The Tall Trees lion is accompanied by a film with former owner Javed Majid and residents of the housing estate that now stands on the site of the nightclub, some now living on the dancefloor they once lived for.

Exhibition

The objects are displayed within the replica Iron Age canoe, now on permanent display at the Yarm Heritage Centre. At night the exhibition transforms into a public art installation visible through the building’s windows, with the canoe appearing to float on a looping, holographic projection of the River Tees and the many people who use it, a nod to the floods that have submerged Yarm High Street over the centuries.