grey is the colour of hope is the fourth audio work compiled by Alan Dunn, artist and Senior Lecturer in Contemporary Art at Leeds Metropolitan University.

Taking its cue from the manners in which the colour grey has been used in literature, art and design from the Old Testament to the present day, the CD brings together new audio works from students and staff in the School of Contemporary Art and Graphic Design alongside artists' compositions and archival material. The School comprises Contemporary Art Practice, Fine Art and Graphic Design.

Permission has been secured and negotiated on each excerpt and the CD is produced in a limited edition of 1,000 and given away freely to students and interested parties. Support for the project has come from the Arts Council of and Metropolitan University and design of the CD packaging is by John Barton and Sean Thomas, two Second Year Graphic Design students.

Composed to echo JMW Turner's 1797 Moonlight, a Study at Millbank ­ a grey landscape shot with one brilliant spash of joy ­ the CD deploys a Leadbelly spoken word introduction from and a newly composed piece from Bill Drummond (Grey and me to bookend a lengthy grey sound collage (with one splash of colour) blending student works and content from Henry Miller, Gerhard Richter, Lydia Lunch, Rodney Marsh and William Shakespeare.

Dunn's accompanying essay traces a personal interest in the colour, referencing Irina Ratushinskaya's prison journal the colour of hope, John Major and late 1800's photographs of Glasgow. To order a free copy of the CD please email Alan Dunn at [email protected] AD&THEFILMTAXI Shave to grey The sound of shaving (to) visage, devenir a gris, 2010.

Andrew Wilson­Lambeth A wilder gray Andrew, a lecturer in Graphic Design at LMU, created A wilder gray by breathing along to Gray, a piece by Alec Wilder from the 1956 Colombia LP Frank Sinatra Conducts Tone Poems of Colour, which is the same age as his own lungs (54 yrs); the first quarter incorporates g­sounds, the next quarter r­sounds, then a­sounds and finally y­ish noises, taking him a complete minute to say gray (grey).

Andrew Tunstall Covered in dust Andrew, a Second Year student in Contemporary Art Practices, created this live instrument version of a chopped up sample soundpiece inspired by Neil Young's Cowgirl in the Sand.

Bill Drummond Grey and me Recorded specifically for the CD in a hotel in Swansea, December 2009. See Penkiln Burn.

Boo Radleys Wake up Boo! The chorus from Wake Up Boo!, performed by The Boo Radleys (p), written by Martin Carr, 1995 Limited is licensed courtesy of Sony Music Entertainment UK Limited.

Chris Wheeler Grey Mist Chris, a Third Year student in Fine Art, comments about his piece: “the Latin word for Grey is Griseus. Canus which means light grey, 'Canus' was used (also meant an old man ­ one with gray hair). 'Caesius' meant blue­gray, and was used for eyes only. With this in mind I have created my artist impression of what this “grey” is to me."

DX5 Fade to grey Excerpts from a cover version of the Visage song, written by Billy Currie, Christopher Payne and Midge Ure and recorded by Visage, Polydor Records 1980.

Gerhard Richter Excerpt from letter to Edy de Wilde, 1975 Incuded by kind permission of Atelier Richter, and read for the CD by Peter Gorschlüter, Head of Exhibitions and Display at Tate Liverpool.

The Grey Panthers Rally cry The Grey Panthers were founded by Maggie Kuhn to further pensioners' rights and to provide a forum for elderly citizens across the globe. In this clip, Judy Lear is the Panther ‘roaring against the war’ in on 13 September 2007. Grey Gordon Orchestra Artists Life From 1939

Harold Offeh Grey gardens Harold, artist and lecturer in Contemporary Art Practices, reads an excerpt from Grey gardens, the 1975 documentary film on the reclusive socialite Edith Beales, first cousin of Jacqueline Kennedy Onassis.

Henry Miller Quiet days in Clichy Excerpts from the opening page are included courtesy of the Henry Miller Estate and Agence Hoffman. Kindly read for the CD by the artist Les Joynes, sitting in the Shabu Shabu East restaurant in New York, January 2010. Miller wrote Clichy, published by Olympia Press in 1956, in New York and opens with a celebration of the French grey ­ gris ­ in its infinite world of thought and freedom.

Hilary Mullaney Green Gates Dublin­based composer Hilary Mullaney studied at the Centre de création musicale Iannis Xenakis in Paris and completed Scipio and completed the Mamori Sound Project residency in Brazil with Francisco Lopez in 2008. Green gates uses recordings of the sound produced when wind blows through the gates of her home during grey, stormy conditions.

Huw Andrews Biodegrade, Grace and UFA Huw, a Third Year Fine Art student, created three pieces for the CD. He notes: “To find grey, the inescapable shade, proved to be harder that expected. Eventually I found its sound on the street and in our voices. Removing syllables and recording steps formed a measured backbeat to grey. Through systematic marches, such repetition creates its pace, the pace of grey.”

Irina Ratushinskaya Grey is the colour of hope The epilogue from Irina Ratushinskaya's Grey is the colour of hope (1988) is included courtesy of the poet herself and Andrew Nurnberg Associates. This recording is copyright of Isis Publishing 1990. On her 29th birthday in 1983, Ratushinskaya was imprisoned for seven years hard labour in a Siberian labour camp for "expressing anti­Soviet propaganda". In atrocious circumstances, she continued to write and smuggle out texts recounting her struggle to see hope in everything, including her grey Zek uniform.

Jeff Young Colourblind Jeff Young’s work includes over twenty plays, radio essays and drama documentaries for Resonance FM and BBC Radio 3 and 4. He has collaborated with Pete Townshend on Lifehouse and Quadrophenia, with Pete Wylie on Pins and needles and his Carandiru, recorded in a Sao Paulo prison, was nominated for a Sony.

Jim Mangnall The new black Jim Mangnall was born in Liverpool in 1930 and has had poetry and short stories published in the UK and the Netherlands with Ambit, Minerva Press, Heinemann and the BBC. His novel The Map Maker was published by Driftwood/Ambit in 2001.

Joe Whitney Fan and Silence Joe, a Second Year Contemporary Art Practices student, created two works for the CD.

John Whitehead Grey John is a Third Year Contemporary Art Practices student.

Lauren Wiles­Shortall Movement and Taping Lauren, a Second Year Contemporary Art Practices student, created two works for the CD.

Leadbelly Grey goose The spoken word introduction to this 1947 recording by Leadbelly is from the recording entitled Leadbelly Sings for Children, SF45047, provided courtesy of Smithsonian Folksway Recordings, © 1999. Used by permission.

Les Connelly 10 percent Les is a Second Year Contemporary Art Practices student and his 10 percent is a piece transformed significantly from its original orchestration of distorted samples of every day grey­ coloured objects. From the first industrial composition, speeds and lengths were adjusted to create this haunting piece.

Liz Stirling Grey ink Liz lectures in Graphis Design and co­runs the MA Programme for the School with Peter Lewis. Grey ink

Lydia Lunch & Teenage Jesus Burning Rubber (excerpt) The line 'the cement glows grey' is from Burning Rubber, words and music by Lydia Lunch, performed by Teenage Jesus, published by Widowspeak (ASCAP/HFA), © Lydia Lunch/Widowspeak.

Mark Hannesson Greymatter Mark Hannesson is a Winnipeg­born composer now living in Edmonton Canada, a founding member of the Collective, and is presently teaching composition and music technology at the University of Alberta.

Mark Whitford For all your sins and Untitled (grey) Mark Whitford is a Third Year Contemporary Art Practices student and his For all your sins is his audio perception of what grey might sound like, higher pitch tones representing white, lower tones black. Untitled (grey) developed from a childhood memory of standing on a ferry disappearing into the mist.

Max Richter The Road Is A Grey Tape Max Richter’s The road is a grey tape is from the CD 24 postcards in full colour, a collection of compositions for alternative ringtones, exploring the anticipation one feels when a mobile rings.

Medea Connection Grey In the Grey Morning Medea Connection hail from .

Midge Ure On writing Fade to grey Midge Ure outlines the story of Ultravox, Thin Lizzy, Gary Numan and Billy Currie that results in the writing of Fade to grey.

Port + Starboard Embraced by Murky Sobs Port + Starboard’s Embraced by Murky Sobs is also based on personal accounts of being caught in dense fog at sea, an unsettling experience, in many cases more dangerous than severe storm conditions and large waves. For anyone who has spent time at sea, the relevance of the colour grey will be self­evident. Talk to experienced seamen and they will no doubt have encountered the disorientation and feelings of helplessness one experiences when caught in a 'grey­out'.

REKS Grey Hairs appears courtesy of Traffic Entertainment and Grey hairs is from 2008.

Rian Treanor Improbability will decide our future Rian is a Third Year Fine Art student and his Improbability will decide our future was produced as part of the the 2009 Chris Watson audio project in The Leeds School of Contemporary Art and Graphic Design.

Rodney Marsh English football is a grey game Becoming disillusioned with the English game in the 1970s, Rodney signed for the Tampa Bay Rowdies and signed off with the line English football is a grey game played on grey days by grey people now recorded specifically for the CD in Miami.

Rory Macbeth Untitled Sustained Note no.3 Artist and lecturer in Fine Art and Contemporary Art Practices, Rory's Untitled Sustained Note no.3 is the Yorkshire Imperial Brass Band all playing a randomly chosen note for as long a they can. The Old Testament Bring down thy grey hairs with sorrow to the grave From Genesis 42:38, variably written bring down my gray hairs with sorrow to Sheol, the grief would drive this gray­haired old man to his grave or bring down my gray hairs with sorrow to hell.

Wil Bolton Static Loop Wil Bolton is an artist working predominantly with sound, combining electronic tones with digitally processed acoustic sounds including field recordings and musical instruments. He also collaborates with Shay Nassi as Shail.

William Shakespeare The grey­eyed morn smiles on the frowning night From Romeo and Juliet (Act 2, scene 3)

back This item is intended solely for educational use, is not for sale or re­sale or any further distribution. This CD has been compiled by Alan Dunn, Associate Senior Lecturer in Contemporary Art, Leeds Metropolitan University and has been supported by the Arts Council of England and Leeds Metropolitan University. It brings together new audio works by staff and students from the School of Contemporary Art and Graphic Design alongside existing artists’ pieces and archival material. Every effort has been made to ensure proper and legal use of all audio and any queries should be addressed to: [email protected].

Edition of 1,000 distributed free of charge, cantaudio031, Leeds/Liverpool, March 2010. This CD is covered by an MCPS Limited Manufacture Licence.

Design by John Barton and Sean Thomas, Second Year Graphic Design students. Cover images taken from a San Francisco apartment window on consecutive days, Chris Bloor, 2009. Manufacture by Mediaheaven, Leeds. Produced by Paul Draper and Adam Monaghan, Dead Frog Studio, Bickerstaffe

This CD has been made possible with the invaluable support, encouragement and co­ operation of many people, including Thomas Good (Editor, Next Left Notes), Alex Wright (Fat Cat Records), David McCleery (Manners McDade Artist Management), Phillippa Watson (Midge Ure Office), Jose Maria Bara (DX5), Daniel Brockman and Tanya Paglia (Medea Connection), Georges Hoffman and Ursula Bender (Agence Hoffman), David Moynihan (Disruptive Publishing), Eric Price and Amy Hundley (Grove Atlantic), Martin Carr (Boo Radleys), Elizabeth Peers (Sony Music), Cathy Carapella (Smithsonian Folkways), Christine Couldwell (Design and Artists Copyright Society), Emily Wrath (Tate Enterprises Ltd), Konstanze Ell (Atelier Richter), Tom Garretson (Lydia Lunch agreement), Joanna Olszowska (Director, EMG Sports & Entertainment), Irina Roberts (Andrew Nurnberg Associates), Becky Curtis (Isis Publishing Ltd), Alice Morgan, James Chinneck, Marion Harrison, Aidan Winterburn and Chris Bloor (Leeds Metropolitan University), Sarah Fisher (Arts Council of England), Paul Lines (Mediaheaven), Derek Horton, Tony Dash, Brigitte Jurack, Heidi & Zak. Grey chronology

Old Testament Shall you bring down my grey hairs with sorrow to the grave (Genesis 42:38) c1550 All cats are grey in the dark, proverb

1591­95 The grey­eyed morn smiles on the frowning night, chequering the eastern clouds with streaks of light, William Shakespeare, Romeo and Juliet: Act 2, Scene 3

1640 First mention of Rikyu grey (Rikyu nezumi) in the Annuals of Choando, Kubo Gondaifu Toshinari’s book of tea in which he encouraged Japanese people to reject the ornate in favour of rusticity. c1840 Regrets are the natural property of grey hairs, Charles Dickens

1797 Moonlight, Study at Millbank, J.M.W. Turner

1822 The earth was grey with phantoms, P.B. Shelley

1911 Little grey home in the West, Hermann Frederic Löhr and D. Eardley­Wilmot

1926 Grey Gull Records open recording studio in equipped with the new electric microphones

1937 The Grey Children – a study in humbug and misery, James Hanley

1944 The old grey hare, featuring Bugs Bunny

1949 What struck Winston was the look of helpless fright on the woman’s greyish face, 1984, George Orwell

1959 What a poem this is … describing every grey mysterious detail, the grey film that caught the actual pink juice of human kind, Jack Kerouac

1965 1965 / 1 – 8, Roman Opalka’s daily painting of consecutive numbers on blank canvas begins, switching to a grey background in 1968. Also, in 1965 the Mamas and The Papas write California Dreaming’s All the leaves are brown and the sky is grey and a year later, Alan Charlton commences his grey monochrome canvases.

1971 The Old Grey Whistle test starts on BBC as Caravan release In the land of pink and grey.

1981 Peter Saville’s grey sleeve design for Joy Division’s Still

1982 You’ve got grey eyes, from Temptation, New Order

1992 They say grey is boring. They say grey is dull. They say grey means John Major. But they’re wrong! Grey can be good! Grey can even be sexy, Esquire Magazine

2003 Into the grey, exhibition of seventeen artists working with grey, Cover Up project space, London

2004 The Grey , Dangermouse’s illegal mesh of The White Album (including Revolution 9) and The Black Album, followed by a mass file sharing day known as Grey Tuesday

2009 I am black or white, I'll never be grey in my life, Diego Maradona back The morning after a revolution by Alan Dunn, February 2010

I wake up and stretch my weary back, knocking over the statue of black CDs by the side of the bed. , said Lenin about Mozart. The sound of dripping water. I open the curtains to a drizzly grey fog enveloping , shadows having slithered off to warmer climes.

Unlike Robert Rauschenberg who limited perception to the shadow of the viewer moving in front of the white canvas, Gerhard Richter removed even the shadow itself. He wrote to Edy de Wilde in 1975 grey is the epitome of non­statement, it does not trigger off feelings or associations, it is actually neither visible nor invisible … and like no other colour it is suitable for illustrating ‘nothing’. It is the only possible equivalent for indifference, for the refusal to make a statement, for lack of opinion, for lack of form.

From the oval mirror, words from the Old Testament stare back at me: bring down thy grey hairs with sorrow to the grave. I pull on my faded Arts Council of England t­shirt and head out to the park. Cool colours like grey can cause you to underestimate time. The playlist: Richard and Mimi Farina Celebrations for a grey day, Bad Religion Grey race, Suzanne Vega Songs in red and grey, Roxy Music Grey lagoons, The Who Blue, red and grey

I live three minutes from Central Park in Wallasey, a simple park opened in 1891 and once the grounds of Liscard Hall. The building was more recently used as an Art College with alumni including OMD’s Andy McCluskey, but on the 7th July 2008 it was razed to the ground. I went out at night to photograph the remaining rubble and used the dark image on the cover of the Revolution CD. Architecture and morality. The sky hangs heavy. Running around the cricket pitch and Council changing rooms, the greys around me turn out to be dull yellow­greens, dull greens or dull blue­violets. Grey wheelie bins for paper. Grey literature. Grey is the colour of hope. During her political imprisonment in Siberia, poet Irina Ratushinskaya fought to transform her surrounds into hope; the survival of a tiny insect, the joy of splicing up a food morsel between ten women, the grey of their Zek uniforms. I force myself to name the greys I see: oyster, Michael Stipe’s headache grey, Glasgow grey, Payne’s Grey, ash and cloud. Kisho Kurokawa reminds us that “in contrast to grey in the West, which is a combination of white and black, Rikyu grey is a combination of four opposing colours: red, blue, yellow and white.”

(Voice over tanoy system): GREY INTERNATIONAL, a leading global advertising agency group, is looking for a graduate to handle day­to­day management of its Intranet site.

Approaching the space where Liscard Hall once stood, the Mersey Tunnel vents come into view in the distance. Sounds from the suburbs. Boston Symphony Orchestra describes their side drum as neutral grey. Perhaps that is colour association rather than a verifiable relationship. It’s always Greyhound Buses, but the colour gray. I think of Leeds’ Frankie Gray. In the early­90s I worked in Frankie’s birthplace, bleak rainy Castlemilk on the South Side of Glasgow, with the Pensioners’ Action Group. For months I encouraged them to draw Frank Sinatra, using white chalk on black paper, slowly zooming in on his eyes. They made a show of it called When I’m old and grey in the local shopping centre. Frank Sinatra Conducts Tone Poems of Colour on Capitol Records from 1956 includes Alec Wilder’s piece Gray, now reworked for this CD by Andrew Wilson­Lambeth.

I was shocked the first time I saw the Ndebele wall paintings of Africa. Many of them were grey and monochrome. They belonged more to the East End of Glasgow, my aunts and uncles’ grey streets of meat markets, bookies, windowless pubs and scrap yards. This dull damp East End was documented in the late 1800’s by a photographer calling himself The Shadow. The earth was grey with phantoms P.B. Shelley wrote. I grew up in that East End with a father obsessed by the 18% grey card, the mathematical middle point between black and white. Oscar Marzaroli’s city of Shades of grey. We had very few shadows. Donald Judd regarded grey as a colour. At this stage we consider the problematic question, whether all human forms and hues are not equally beautiful, and whether custom and self­deceit are not the causes of preference? I reach the beginning again, breathing heavily, my halfway point. Listening to Kelvin K’s Revolution beats. Colour temperature is measured in Kelvins and to the human eye a white wall is 2800k. In 1979 I went to a huge grey concrete Secondary School soundtracked by The Specials singing I’m the man in grey, just the man at C&A, The Beat painting your life with a permanent grey and Madness’ Grey day. In 1984 we read Orwell describing Winston’s fear of the grey faces. I write prosaically. Around the football pitch. Ferguson blamed defeat on United’s grey strip. “English football is a grey game played on grey days by grey people” said Rodney Marsh as he stepped onto the plane for Florida. Grey satellite dishes. Grey squirrels. At art school in the mid­80s I became interested in grey, in Richter’s grey, Morrissey’s silent and grey, Hüsker Dü’s all I see is grey; John Major became Prime Minister whilst I was doing my MA and in 1993 I produced Europe’s biggest mural at the time, turning a vast car park’s grey surface green. The public, and The Sun, slated it. I should have kept it grey. Devenir a gris.

At 20 I started going grey up top. Is it just a lack of melanin? Back in Boston, the University Medical Research Centre discovered that individuals who start to grey while still young are six times more likely to suffer a degenerative thinning of the bones. “Let the grey ones beware! The general public no longer loves its grey ones so dearly” warned D.H. Lawrence. Smokers are four times more likely to begin greying prematurely. Will the woman in my life like my grey hair? I contacted the Cologne branch of The Grey Panthers. Prevent grey hairs with our special stress­free mortgage for first time buyers. The pensioners I jog past don’t look like roaring. There are over one thousand pensioners in UK jails. My legs ache, each stain on the grey path a little grey country. A meeting of The Grey Council is adjourning. Grey cloaks stand around a circular table. I proposed hiring a Miro exhibition to contrast my Payne’s Grey suite of Kilmarnock paintings. I moved to the grey town of Derby and read James Hanley’s Grey Children – a study in humbug and misery. I moved to Liverpool. When skies are grey asked Steve McManaman whether his favourite colour was red or blue. “Neither” he diplomatically replied, “it’s grey.” Grey is a colour with a gentle demeanor, perfect for autumn, winter and spring, a colour for the business world, serious and respected. It used to be that newly pressed records were first listened to by grey suited doormen and if they could whistle it after one listening, the music had passed the old grey whistle test. The 2005 compilation Music for Jogging proudly boasted on its sleeve Bonus feature: bpm for each track included. Six years ago American artist Margaret Muller was brutally murdered as she jogged through Victoria Park in London. Movement in the bushes. Blow up. In What sound does a colour make? Kathleen Forde recounted philosopher John Locke’s tale of a studious blind man bragging that he understood what the colour scarlet signified … the sound of a trumpet. Twice around Central Park every day trying to work this grey project out. An old L’Oreal advert lay in a puddle: This is today’s grey, so radiant, it’s a revolution! Walking through New York’s Central Park one grey icy foggy morning, I hear only Rory Macbeth’s Untitled Sustained Note no.3. The opposite of grey could only be grey. I’m doing the running for the kids. I’m running to make the grey bearable, to make it hopeful, like having someone film me having my last ever cigarette for Self portrait with last cigarette.

I approach the final stretch, the skies darkening, the cricket pavilion morphing into a pier, the sight screens into sails. I’m running through Tate Britain past Turner’s Moonlight: a study at Millbank. A foggy greying skyline is salvaged only by a brilliant yellow moon. C’mon kids. Have we ever let you down? The moonlight in the grey. Wake up. It’s a beautiful morning.

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