Andrew Dodds Projects & Exhibitions       Home Projects & Exhibitions All Things > Wunderkammer Ask FM Underfall Arcadia... Alive! After the Deluge Life in the Woods Arcade Lost in Space more... Publications Contact       All Things Sound installation: speakers, amplifier, player, edited recordings of North East Youth Choir, 2009   Commissioned by BALTIC Centre for Contemporary Art for 'A Duck for Mr Darwin', a group exhibition by nine international artists including Mark Dion, Dorothy Cross, Tania Kovats and Charles Avery. ‘All Things’ responds to the recent history of the North East’s education system, in particular the sponsorship of the UK’s first ‘Creationist Academy’ in Gateshead by the Vardy Foundation. The North East Youth Choir were recorded performing the 19th century hymn, 'All Things Bright and Beautiful' written by Cecil Frances Alexander which portrays a sense of wonder and celebration of the natural world. However, through our contemporary sensibilities it can also be understood as dealing with issues of class, a belief in human dominion over nature and a sense of entitlement. By re-inserting a verse which has fallen from favour and no longer sung because it alludes to the British class system, our attention is drawn to the cultural construction of ‘nature’ and religious belief systems, and to a celebration of the individual voice over the institutional.