As a Child With a Matchstick Castle

About

Staffordshire St presents ‘As a Child with a Matchstick Castle’ a large-scale installation by F.A.F that explores how layers of history and myth are interwoven. The largest Roman mosaic to be found in fifty years was unearthed directly beneath the site of F.A.F’s temporary work ‘Constant’s New Garden’ and living space ‘The Caravan Complex’. This brought a halt to the development of the flats that had forced their departure. The mosaic is thought to be from the floor of a dining room of an upmarket motel, a place where visiting officials may have stayed. The endurance of this mosaic, that they had once unwittingly lived above, prompted a reflection on the temporal nature and transience of F.A.F's previous architectural structures. In this new work F.A.F explores the mythologies surrounding their own works, creating a fictional scenario in which the remnants of a past project has been unearthed.

F.A.F has brought together the broken fragments of a whole mosaic floor to float between the cast iron pillars supporting the main gallery at Staffordshire st. The deconstructed parts of the mosaic are cradled within a steel structure, turning the gallery into an archaeological site. Amongst the mosaic islands will be a wooden structure that emerges like a sapling to form a vaulted ceiling. A scaffold platform will create a vantage point in which to bridge the gaps of dereliction and imagine the complete tableau. The design of the floor documents moments of F.A.F’s previous projects that have long since been bulldozed to make way for redevelopment. Although the fragility of ‘As a Child with a Matchstick Castle’ alludes to a sense of abandonment, it’s met with an optimism for growth with the possibility of new beginnings.

F.A.F emerged out of a shared indifference to the financial and physical restraints placed on the creation of large scale sculptures in London. In a disused industrial site, which had been fly-tipped with construction debris, this shared sentiment first manifested itself with the creation of ‘Stephen Bhatti’s Diving Tower’.

Using the physical limitations of sites, as well as the materials contained within, F.A.F creates temporary, fantastical structures. They introduce absurd fictional sub-plots into the periphery of the city. The works exist in the realm of myth due to the in-accessibility of these locations; sightings are fleeting with glimpses being caught from places like the top deck of a bus or through the fence of a station platform.

Between 2019-21 F.A.F developed an alternative living situation, occupying a car park in London Bridge. This saw a transition for F.A.F with their construction style being applied to functional spaces. Both this and their earlier work focuses on the repurposing of redundant materials and space, reimagining the normality of the domestic within cities.

Alongside their personal practices, F.A.F maintain a co-operative working method that weaves individual research interests with a shared trust and desire to realise ambitious sculptural installations.

For further information please contact: info@staffordshirest.com