Architect Part 1 is a new short film directed by artist Laura Gannon, featuring architect Jessica Reynolds and with sound composition by Susan Stenger. Set in a rural County Mayo, the film reveals the interior and exterior of a house standing alone on the side of a mountain called Devilsmother. Abandoned to the elements of time and nature, newer houses were built along the road while this house has stood empty for over forty years.

A family history is subtly revealed as the film layers architecture in a rural environment with the movement of people and the passing of time. The house is surrounded by fields of sheep, the main agriculture in this region on the border of Mayo and Connemara. Jessica’s grandmother was one of thousands who emigrated to England in the 1950s, as Ireland’s population declined. The house remains empty, a monument to this mass emigration and the emptying out of people from the landscape.

The house has been left to nature, now a weathered grey building standing forlorn in the landscape. The interior of the house is in a ruined state, ceilings collapsing, windows broken, mould and damp patches spreading as nature intervenes. Blistered by time, the walls still retain colours of pigmented depth, leaving behind abstract compositions of sunshine yellow and emerald green on the interior walls.

Revisiting her family’s former home, Jessica appears at punctuated moments, amplified by beats and drone sounds. A figure in the landscape, she reintroduces herself back into her family history having last visited at the age of nine.

The film is a collaboration between two friends who both have family connections to Mayo. Laura is a visual artist making paintings and films focusing on female creativity and specific architecture sites. Jessica is co-founder of vPPR architects.