Co-presenters included:
David Abram (USA - Author: Spell of the Sensuous), Kate Soper (Writer/Editor), Platform, Prof. Una Chaudhari, Sue Clifford.

'Landing Strip for Souls' evolved in response to an invitation to develop new work on 'social sculpture and democracy' for this international, interdisciplinary conference organised by The Centre for the Study of Environmental Change and the Department of Theatre Studies, Lancaster University.

This 'parallel process' action engages the audience in an event concerned with sustainability, democracy, transformative creative strategies and an expanded view of the senses.

On entering the space, framed by five stretched deerskins, each person receives a potato and a stone, both hand-size. Whilst the audience is being seated, Sacks, at a piano behind the skins, and an assistant, intone very low sounds, moving between groaning and a death knell. Returning to the 'world of the rational', Sacks, in front of the skins, welcomes everyone to 'this place of questions', oppositions and the need to choose.

What follows is a 'parallel process' lecture/action moving between rational discourse and the intuitive, through argument, poetic voice work and trance states.

Loud car and aeroplane sounds, made by Sacks as the 'trickster', remind us of the horrors out there, interrupting a vision of interconnectedness and interdependence that will help us know when to say 'yes' or 'no'.

After retelling a dream in which Joseph Beuys describes this 'landing strip for souls', Sacks attempts to locate the 'space opening sounds' indicated in the dream, whilst four assistants extend the 'landing strip' at waist height.

Mirroring the blueness above us, souls are welcomed into the 'imaginative space' to assist us. After a long silence Sacks opens up discussion about 'social sculpture and democracy'.

As Judy Ling Wong (Black Environment Network) said: 'Now this imaginative space is in our minds'. The work has been developed to be used with different groupings and in varying contexts.

 Outline of event at the Between Nature conference at Lancaster University, 2000

Scout Niblett performs Landing Strip on her album:  I Conjure Series
This track was inspired by Landing Strip for Souls. Scout Niblett was an art and music student of Shelley's at Nottingham Trent University from 1993 to 1995. The dialogue between them continues...