‘The Jingle Book’ Alan Dunn
Image Description:
Image one: Exhibition photograph of one portrait-orientated book, slightly larger than A5, with a fluorescent orange cover and the title ‘The Jingle Book’ across three lines, each word centred in large white letters and each word in a different font, alongside is an open copy of the book. Surrounding the book is stickers, a postcard, and a short-hand badge to do the tasks within. Image credit: Harry Meadley
Image two: Exhibition photograph of the post card artwork ‘BSL She Sell’ that accompanied ‘The Jingle Book’ which is a 6 by 4 inch post card showing front and back. The front shows the tongue twister ‘She sells sea shells’ as performed in British Sign Language. The reverse has the tongue twister spelled out in capital letters in English.
Audio Description:
‘The Jingle Book’ tracks a four-year research project by Dr Alan Dunn exploring the use of sound, and specifically tongue twisters, within dementia care homes. Dunn was one of six artists on the ‘Where the Arts Belong’ project between the Bluecoat, Liverpool’s Centre for Contemporary Art, and Belong, providers of bespoke dementia care villages and the tongue twister work contributed towards the winning of the Markel Third Sector Care Award in Creative Arts and received additional Government backing from the DCMS during Covid.
The book contains texts by Dunn, Laura Yates (Bluecoat) and Professor Claire Surr (Centre for Dementia Research, LBU) that reflect upon the uniqueness of tongue twisters as nonsensical communications, multi-generational fun activities and potential aids in fluency. These are supported by a series of visual and object-based prompts by LBU students and staff, Joanne Tiffany, Melody Parsk and Dr Chloe Bradwell, that suggest new ways of integrating tongue twisters into daily life, including the non-verbal, non-visible, the edible and the coded. ‘The Jingle Book’ was published in 2024 by the Bluecoat and supported by Leeds Beckett University in an edition of 200 copies.
Artist Bio
Glasgow-born artist Dr Alan Dunn devises projects using sound and digital images, collaborating with thousands of citizens to unlock hidden stories. Alan is a Reader in Art and Design at Leeds Beckett University and has developed projects with BBC Radio, Tate Britain, ICA, National Science & Media Museum, Liverpool Art Prize, Channel 4 and recently won the inaugural Liverpool Sculpture Prize. He is based in Liverpool City Region and currently working on long-term projects exploring the use of tongue twisters within dementia care homes and underwater recording around the Isle of Man.
External Links:
Instagram: www.instagram.com/alandunn67/
Website: alandunn67.co.uk/
‘The Jingle Book’ PDF: https://alandunn67.co.uk/jinglebook.html