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Hidden Codex utilised inquiry based creative practice to respond to an invitation by Gateshead Library to create and show an artwork in their exhibition space. I explored their archive and discovered a book by a Polish immigrant called Frank Kojay.

Hidden Codex

The book is a large scale, hand made and hand written object. Each page is roughly 3 A4 sized pages in length, so open up the book looks really impressive. Frank wrote it over the course of his life and it contains a collection of writings focusing on his explorations in and around and the natural history of the Derwentvale area of Gateshead. It also features random lists, excerpts copied from newspapers that give it a disjointed feel. The book is hand written, illustrated and features some collage and found images. It has been bound professionally, Frank bequested the book to the Head Librarian of Gateshead Central Library, on Prince Consort Road, Gateshead, UK with the explicit instructions that the book was to enter and be kept in the archive but never seen by anyone… In this project I tried to honour Frank’s wishes. Over a series of workshops I led volunteers on field recording expeditions visiting and recording at locations and natural events that Frank wrote about and included in his book. In the book there are lots of descriptions of Frank getting up early and taking blankets and sleeping bags into the Derwent Vale to listen to the dawn chorus. The dawn chorus is the symphony of song performed by birds looking for love, and to defend their patch. This begins in spring, as the days lengthen.
I took several voluneers on dawn chorus listening expeditions to make field recordings. These were used in the final exhibition.

Exhibition
The exhibition showed the book but only one spread of content, field recordings enabled audiences to listen to the areas Frank visited in his book but not to see them.

Setting up the exhibition in the gallery space at Gateshead Library