Francesca Albini - Translocation Dislocation (words by Jack Low)

Welcome to the Translocation and Dislocation exhibition, a selection of eclectic artworks that have been placed or screened beyond the tradition gallery walls. Alongside the art, you can read written works by our First Responders. We will choose a different location for each artwork, the art might be placed in a complementary location (to add to the narrative) or juxtaposed against a competing backdrop to create new meaning.

An open hearted figurine from Francesca Albini waits on a bridge in Kelvingrove Park in Glasgow today, do you dare flick the switch and discover the hidden secrets of the lady with the red hair? First Responder Jack Low tries to unravel her mysteries, read his words below.

Francesca Albini

First Responder: Jack Low

The movement of something from one place to another

I am miles from where I came from
But I am still the lady with the red hair
It disobeys the movement of the wind like I’ve always despised
Holding something back,
not free like the shadows I see from where I sit
Chopping and changing, changing in the wind
My eyes are wide, wide enough to see what I can’t have and always narrow enough to see myself,
If you looked in far enough you would see my home,
A place, the one place, where my eyes can only stretch to the confines of familiarity
Maybe they will dance far enough from there, to here
To this stretch of stone spotted by history and a thousand finger prints
And I will see another familiar sight.
Or
just
A familiar disturbance,
Can I ever break from the family I had when
I hold the key to my mothers youth
Yet no power to unlock it?
Just as my own heart is held in shackles,
Like a proper lady,
Just as I was taught,
Far enough from the original but never out of line,
The people that pass never see anything despite the usual,
Yet I sit there, new and unusual, and even then
You can read all about me
And never see me
Never place me
Or pick me out from the line up, a fallen leaf, the passers-by, the state of me once I am discarded,
Can you keep the memory of where I was?
Would you remember me?

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Francesca Albini divides her life between literary and artistic endeavours. She is a PhD in Classics, and has worked in publishing for her entire adult life, as a translator, author and editor. She is a self taught artist and photographer. Her work is inspired by folk art, but also by design. Albini is a collector of memories, and uses any medium that allows her to remember and share, express feelings and narrate stories. From line drawings to plastic cameras, from collage to upcycled jewellery and dolls. "My work is playful and dreamy, child-like but also philosophical. I fall in and out of love with many styles and tools, but I'm always me, whatever I do."

Jack Low is a Brighton based writer. He published his debut poetry pamphlet, aesthetics of a dropout, in 2019.