Greenland blog 05: On Greenlandic airports, or, what to do in an emergency

Dash-7 propeller, Kangerlussuaq airport, Greenland. Image copyright Margaret Sharrow, 2008

I should say here that my change of planes was necessitated not just by the convenience of the Air Greenland network, but by geography: the reason that international flights do not go directly to the capital, Nuuk, is because of an almost complete lack of flat land in Greenland. There are only two places on the entire west coast with enough flat land to create a runway long enough to accommodate modern jumbo passenger craft: the deep fjords at Narsarsuaq and Kangerlussuaq. Thus anyone wishing to travel to Nuuk from abroad must first land at Kangerlussuaq, then transfer to a smaller plane that can land at Nuuk’s smaller airstrip. Said airstrip, blasted out of four billion year old rock, is the largest that can be built at Nuuk, not because there isn’t more land (a new suburb is springing up beyond the airport), but because there isn’t any more flat land. Like all the towns in Greenland that I visited, the mountains rise up pretty sharpish behind the last rows of houses.

The prospect of the next leg of my journey was made a little odd by the abrupt termination of my view of the interior of the plane by a wall, two rows in front of my seat. Somehow on a plane seating only around sixty I had been expecting to see the flight deck, to have some sense of where we were going. My unease was compounded by the on board safety cards. These depicted fabulous scenes of what would happen in the event of a crash, how one was to be bundled up, Michelin man-like, and await rescue sitting on plane seat cushions in the middle of a glacier.

The engines started, the propellers buzzed into action, and I prepared my 35mm camera, one of my medium format cameras, and my digital. There was no time for panic or disappointment. Like an understudy thrust into the spotlight, I was on!

26 August 2008 10:11 recalled 9 January 2011

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Margaret Sharrow: Albert Dock intervention, Liverpool

EMERGENCY WORDS intervention, Albert Dock, Liverpool, 26 November 2010. Image copyright Margaret Sharrow, 2010

What happens when an object that is apparently perfectly in context (a life ring at a harbour) is taken out of context (walked around the harbour as if it was an oversized handbag)?

Not a performance as such, but an intervention. Walking by the National Maritime Museum. No public interaction requested, though plenty of people noticed, commented, wondered. Assumptions of purloining. A stunt? Official business? Improbably dressed harbour staff? A souvenir of Liverpool? Crime in progress? When standing still checking camera batteries, I was even mistaken for a museum wax model. Upon moving, startled teenagers concluded that perhaps I was a costumed museum interpreter/performer. 

As I explained to the apologetic and very polite dock security man, the life ring was provided by me on loan from the Harbourmaster at Aberaeron, i.e. NOT NICKED from the docks! 

EMERGENCY WORDS: Margaret Sharrow performs at Lampeter, Manchester, Liverpool Biennial

Image: Life ring, Pembrokeshire. Copyright Margaret Sharrow, 2010.

What words would you want to save you in an emergency? That's the question Lampeter artist Margaret Sharrow will be asking members of the public in her new performance piece, 'EMERGENCY WORDS'.

The event will premiere in Lampeter at the Poets and Peasants Society, Thursday 9 September at 8:30 pm in the Castle Green, Bryn Road.

Sharrow will offer audience members cards on which to write their chosen life-saving words. The cards will then be attached to a life ring, kindly on loan from the Aberaeron Harbourmaster's office. Later in the evening Sharrow will read aloud the collection of words.

'It's a chance for people to reflect on what gives them comfort or redemption, and on what constitutes an emergency,' says Sharrow. 'And also, what might be important or sustaining for other people. By having only a small card to express themselves, people will become part of a kind of live Twitter event - except all contributions will be anonymous.'

Sharrow, a graduate of Aberystwyth University's School of Art and winner of a Geoffrey Crawshay Memorial Travel Scholarship for travel to Greenland in 2008, has previously performed at Lampeter's Poets and Peasants group. In June she performed 'Shrouded Artist', following on from her mixed media exhibition 'Shrouded Forms' at Lampeter's Town Hall Café-Deli in April this year.

'EMERGENCY WORDS' will travel to Manchester's greenroom, 54-56 Whitworth Street West, on Friday 1 October from 5:00 to 9:00 pm, as part of an 'Emergency' themed weekend of performance art co-produced with the arts organisation hÅb. In November Sharrow plans to perform the piece at the Liverpool Biennial. Times and venues will be confirmed on her website, margaretsharrow.blogspot.com.