<p dir="ltr">Sam Machell is an artist and writer based in Plymouth who graduated from <a href="https://www.aup.ac.uk/courses/undergraduate/ba-hons-fine-art" target="_blank" rel="noreferrer noopener">BA (Hons) Fine Art</a> at Arts University Plymouth in 2020. Reflecting ecological and political anxieties, his practice is concerned with the intersection of sprawling systems and individual bodies. Writing, as both a process and a material, is positioned as the centre around which other works can orbit; the guiding fiction magnified into performances, diagrams, cartoons and videos, like the text of an illuminated manuscript. His ongoing project, the expanded fantasy novel, ‘Dinner Machine’, explores the lives and messy relationships of humans and animals within an absurdly large and complex castle.</p> <p dir="ltr">Sam said: “Over an extravagant feast, the castle’s nobles wax philosophic. Talking with their mouths full, they discuss the ramifications and grotesqueries of the commercial meat industry. The Tattoo’d Pig in question is a magical animal who possesses the power of speech and knowledge beyond itself.”<br /></p>

<p dir="ltr">Working performatively within the gallery space, Sam will tattoo, tan and stitch pig skins to create marginalia for the story. This chapter will be performed in a full dramatic reading held on 26 January 2023 at 6pm. Free tickets for the performance and reading can be <a href="https://www.eventbrite.co.uk/e/dinner-machine-the-tale-of-the-tattood-pig-reading-by-sam-machell-tickets-514931312417">booked in advance on Eventbrite</a>.</p> <p dir="ltr">Artist and lecturer <a href="https://www.aup.ac.uk/people/tom-milnes">Dr Tom Milnes</a>, whose work in the city was seen most recently transforming the Hoe and Smeaton’s Tower into the cutting-edge ‘Ashnihilation’ augmented reality experience, has curated a programme of exhibitions, window-display exhibitions and events in the city centre. Featuring artworks created by Arts University Plymouth students, graduates and staff members, the residency is part of the Meanwhile Use scheme to support imaginative projects that occupy vacant spaces in the city centre, and has been running alongside and complementing the British Art Show 9 activities taking place across the city.<br /></p>