Abstract

Orange Herald, Violet Club, Yellow Sun, Blue Streak. The names are reminiscent of tubes of oil paint or jars of pigment. But they are all code names for military projects in the UK during the 1950s, many of which were concealed in top-secret rural bases like RAF Spadeadam. How have contemporary artists responded to the revelation of these once-classified schemes, their hidden locations, and the threatening presences that they engendered? From the wilds of Orford Ness to the archives of the Library of Congress, via hard-boiled eggs and mysterious swamps, this paper provides an introduction to some twenty-first century artistic practices that reflect on the twentieth century’s fall-out.

How to Cite:

Streffen, I., (2013) “The Underlying Horror of the English Countryside”, Dandelion: Postgraduate Arts Journal and Research Network 4(2). doi: https://doi.org/10.16995/ddl.287