Joanna Holland & [SYNTAX ERROR]

alarm call - a warning cry made by a bird or other animal to signal imminent danger. alarm call (medical) - a system which signals that urgent medical attention is required. A close up of the nest which formed part of my ‘alarm call’ installation: collected twigs, deer hide, old medication boxes, ribbon, surround sound, tree branch, wrapping paper. The nest was accompanied by a digital image and a surround sound version of the soundscape to the left of this image. Image by Reece Straw

‘alarm call’ – new soundscape created for ‘Out of the Blue’. Thinking about journeys, diagnosis, medication & side effects, planetary health and biodiversity loss, especially the plight of ground nesting birds. Creative captioning by Chloe Page © Joanna Holland, 2023

'warning' - new video work created for 'Out of the Blue'. With brilliant captions by Chloe Page. Thinking about precarity, medical diagnosis and planetary health - sea level rise, biodiversity loss, drought etc. Set to a backdrop of MRI & CT scanners, IV drip alarms etc. © Joanna Holland, 2023

'Out of the Blue' opens at originalprojects in Great Yarmouth, Norfolk on Saturday 21st October at 12noon. Artist talk & performance by the brilliant Dolly Sen at 2pm. ALL WELCOME. [image descriptor] a light sculpture in neon pink spells out the word 'autoimmunity'. It sits on top of a vivid cobalt blue wall.

An external shot of 'alam call', an immersive audio-visual installation at 'Out of the Blue' - featuring birdsong alongside MRI and CT scanner sounds (c) Joanna Holland

Seeking funding and venues for ‘Horror Autotoxicus’. Images, text and object provocations explore a real life haunting - the nightmare scenario of the immune system attacking its host. [image ‘Care-full’ © Joanna Holland & Suzie Larke]

Seeking funding and venues for ‘Reverie – a dream of autoimmunity’. An installation where soundscapes & photography share how it feels to live, fly & fall with autoimmunity. [image ‘SUSPENDED’ © Joanna Holland & Suzie Larke]

'Imagined worlds' (2023) - collage as a means to think about our relationship with nature

[SYNTAX ERROR], the pseudonym sometimes used for my artist-self is inspired by the following rhetoric: Syntax – rules that govern the ways in which words combine to form phrases, clauses, and sentences, the ‘correct’ order or arrangement of words and phrases. Syntax errors are ‘mistakes’ in using the language. But what if this order or language doesn’t make sense to you? What if the rules that govern actually exclude and disable? In computer programming, a programme will not compile until all syntax errors are corrected. A syntax error may also occur when an invalid arrangement is entered. What if we need a new inclusive language and a way of being that is not ‘invalid’ and that does not need to be ‘corrected’? (image © Joanna Holland).

First solo exhibition! Photographs, video, soundscapes and text share real experiences of diagnosis, medication, side effects, chronic fatigue, hospitalisation, and the impact of [in]visible disability on family life. Works also explore an interconnectedness with nature, and the complex entanglements between self, planetary health, climate change and biodiversity loss.

'School Run' (2022). An experimental video short which explores the impact of living with chronic illness on family life. And how the things that we take for granted and consider monotonous are actually very precious. The audio uses sounds from MRI and CT scanners (video © Joanna Holland).

Co-curating with dramaturg Zoe Svendsen on 'THE FACTORY OF THE FUTURE (WE KNOW NOT WHAT WE MAY BE)' (2018-19); workshops and provocations engaged conservationists and policy makers in whether human ingenuity can restore our relationship with our planet. Dialogues were re-enacted in a series of short films exploring an imagined future. Whilst Assistant Curator, working with John Fanshawe, at Cambridge Conservation Initiative (image © metisarts.co.uk).

Co-curating with environmental artists Ackroyd & Harvey & curator John Fanshawe (2018-19); recording broadcast stories and programming a series of public events about their participatory canvas 'Seeing Red.. Overdrawn' – which highlights critically endangered species. Whilst Assistant Curator at Cambridge Conservation Initiative (image © Ackroyd & Harvey / CCI).

Researching and developing 'The Endangered Landscape Artist Residencies' (2020/2021), a dynamic international ART + CONSERVATION collaboration at Cambridge Conservation Initiative (image © CCI).

R&D and fundraising for '[in]visible expanse' (2022). An exhibition which highlights the lack of representation of Disabled contemporary artists in the cultural landscape and the urgent need to address this. Works explore, amongst other things, unhelpful societal binary narratives such as: well / ill, able / disabled, unhealthy / healthy, invisible / visible.

‘Out of the Blue’ – my first solo exhibition opens on 28th July. Photographs, video, soundscapes and text explore lived experience of chronic health and an interconnectedness with nature. Thank you Attenborough Arts Centre for hosting me and ACE for funding this. Touring to originalprojects and Wysing Broadcasts (online) later this year. [image 'Rapture' (c) Joanna Holland]

'I SLEEP / I DREAM / I DREAM / I SLEEP' (2022) Can you untangle the uncanny? Can you recreate a dream? R&D for a new sensory collaboration with photographer Suzie Larke (video still © Joanna Holland)

'Cyanopic landscapes' (2022) consists of a series of images which explore a world that is tinted with blue. It asks how it feels emotionally when one of your senses changes unexpectedly? How does it alter your perception of the world and the perception of self within a world or self that no longer make sense?

Fundraising and R&D has begun for 'Out of the blue - landscapes of chronic illness'

Creative Producing 'Fantastical Cambridgeshire' for the wonderous Cambridge C&I: A 24-hour sensory event celebrating people & local wild spaces (2017) – co-creating with communities & collaborating with artists Deb Wilenski & Helen Stratford (image (c) Maciek Platek / CC&I).

In residence (2021/22) at Wysing, an experimental arts centre for contemporary artists. Holland & [SYNTAX ERROR] are researching narratives of [in]visible disability; looking to identify and better understand curatorial practice which explores a more inclusive cultural landscape (image © Wysing Arts).

Assistant Curator for ‘Breaking Point: Fragility in clay and nature’, Museum of Zoology, University of Cambridge (2021). Three women ceramicists, with a strong interest in the environmental movement, exhibit works in and amongst Museums specimens, to engage, provoke and stimulate discussion. Whilst at Cambridge Conservation Initiative (image © artist Mella Shaw / photographer Andrew Norman).

Working as Assistant Curator, alongside John Fanshawe to develop the interdisciplinary 'Arts, Science & Conservation Programme' (2018-2021) at Cambridge Conservation Initiative (image © Ackroyd & Harvey / CCI).

Re-mapping the everyday through 'creative adventuring' as part of Fantastical Cambridgeshire (2017) – collaborative creative production with wonderful communities & artists Sally Todd, Filipa Pereira-Stubbs & Helen Stratford for Cambridge C&I (image © Maciek Platek / CC&I).

'Electromagnetic Field' (2022) - experimental video work exploring humancentric technological conveniences and natures existence alongside them. The work transposes electromagnetic sounds over video of natural habitats (various fields). Featuring: clover / buttercups / mouse (dead) / grasses / bees / flies / shield & other bugs / rabbit (dead) / light switch / landline phone / digital radio / mouse / lightbulb / mobile phone.

'The Field' (2022) - an experimental soundscape which shares 'found sounds' - gathered whilst lying in various fields. Featuring: robin / crow / plane / pheasant / car / chif chaf / wind / blackbird etc.

'Reverie - A dream of autoimmunity' (2022). A dream inspires a short story which explores how it feels to live, fly & fall with autoimmunity. R&D has begun to create a new immersive installation with film, images and soundscape.

'Fabrication' (2022) - experimental sound work exposing hidden electro-magnetic sounds found all around us in our everyday lives. Featuring: light switch / landline phone / digital radio / mouse / lightbulbs / mobile phone

R & D for 'Beyond Light' (2022). The unobtainable and the possible.

'SHIFT' (2021/22) - extended R&D time for audio-visual experimentation and collaboration - including new soundscape composition and video installation. Funded by Arts Council, England's ‘Developing Your Creative Practice’. (video still © Joanna Holland)

'Researching cyanopsia' (2021/22) – the medical term for seeing everything tinted with blue. What happens when your vision does something it's not supposed to do? How does it feel emotionally when one of your senses changes unexpectedly? (image © Joanna Holland)

'Of Fragility & Friendship (after Rachel Ruysch)' (2022) [private commission]. A still (real) life - inspired by the Dutch Flower Paintings of the 17th and 18th centuries. It explores loss, possibility and acts of kindness. (image © Joanna Holland).

'2 metres X 3 metres' (2021) refers to the size of the personal space around a bed in a hospital ward, a space bordered by medical ‘privacy’ curtains. The works are a series of photographs taken whilst being in this space. They are deliberately abstracted works which ask people to consider the space in a new way. The clinical space becomes a creative space.

'And then everything I knew was true, was true' – a sensory, immersive installation by [SYNTAX ERROR] is shortlisted for a 2021 UNLIMITED Emerging Artist Award.

'Medical Outlier' (2021 / 2022) - a series of images contemplating confinement and support structures. (image © Joanna Holland)

R&D for 'She's not got the stomach for it' (2021/22) – a work in progress.

'Lockdown locality' (2020/21) - a 14-month photography project. Thank you Histon Road Cemetery - I love you. Sounds of the cemetery is a work in progress. Watch this space! (image © Joanna Holland).

'Lost Words and Found Connections' (2018) – sensory adventures into language and literacy through nature. Creative Production for Cambridge C&I with brilliant children & the fab Ruth Sapsed & Filipa Pereira-Stubbs (image © CC&I).