Manchester Uk
English
The Secret City is a 12-minute documentary about the Manchester neighbourhoods of St Michael’s Flags and Angel Meadow Park, using moving-image, spoken word and contemporary music composition to explore a relationship between new building developments and pieces of Manchester’s social history.
This piece was developed in layers, later turned to acts:
Act 1. High Rise: A conversation between old and new buildings. Do they feel exposed standing alone? Are they united by time and memories of what they have seen?
Act 2. The ground: Pavements and gravestones, and anything related to the Earth. Reincarnated inanimacy. Objects and spaces that have been present to new and old life. A valley.
Act 3. Underland: People buried below surface, inhabitants of the past, remembered through history of this place. What does it mean to have history speak on a person's behalf? How might that feel?