The Gathering / Yr Helfa
The Gathering / Yr Helfa is a site-specific walking performance created in collaboration with Hafod y Llan Farm in Snowdonia. Inspired by the annual sheep gather, it reveals the day-to-day and seasonal workings of the farm while exploring cycles of fertility, reproduction, work and landscape. The performance took 200 participants on a six-kilometre circular journey through the landscape and into the farm, where they encountered installations, performance, film, poetry, music, sound and everyday farming activities.
The performance evolved over a four-year period through a process of observing the farm at work and responding to the life cycles of the ewes, the flock, the farm and the landscape. Gillian Clarke, National Poet for Wales, wrote a twelve-month sequence of poems for the performance. Nigel Stewart developed bespoke choreography, while John Hardy and his team worked as music consultants, sourcing regional folk tunes to which extracts of the poems were sung.
The Gathering / Yr Helfa was supported by the team at Hafod y Llan Farm and the National Trust. It was performed by the shepherds and their dogs, two hundred sheep, a company of five professional performers, aerial artist Kate Lawrence, the award-winning Deiniolen Silver Band, and children from Beddgelert Primary School. Together they created a performance in which farming, landscape, poetry, music and movement became inseparable, revealing the rhythms of the mountain and the lives lived within it.
This is a piece that makes you look and listen hard. It’s lyrical but unsentimental, bloody and brutal. It makes the mountain sing.
— Lyn Gardner, The Guardian ★★★★
Full review Guardian review here.
Observer on Sunday review here.
Created, directed and designed by Louise Ann Wilson
Written by Gillian Clarke
Additional writing (The Boy's texts) by Louise Ann Wilson, using the words of Arwyn Owen
Choreography Nigel Stewart
Music consultation John Hardy Music
Sound and film Recorded, directed and designed by Louise Ann Wilson
Film technical editing Janan Yakula
Additional sound recording and editing Tic Ashfield
Assistant designer Dorrie Scott
Performance
Actors Ffion Dafis, Emyr Gibson, Gwyn Vaughan Jones, Gwion Aled Williams and Meilir Rhys Williams
Aerial artist Kate Lawrence
Shepherding Bryn Griffiths, Roger Hughes, Elgan Jones, Trefor Jones, Arwyn Owen, Tudur Parry, Andrew Roberts, Arthurs Williams and their dogs
Music performed by Deiniolen Silver Band
Archive photographs presented by the children of Beddgelert Primary School
Production
Production Manager Jacob Gough
Project Manager Fiona Curtis
Costume Supervisor Angharad Matthews
Design Assistants Ruby Spencer-Pugh, Phoebe Tonkin, David Honeybone and Stefan Gwyn
Produced by National Theatre Wales with Migrations & LAW Co.
Supported by the team at Hafod y Llan Farm and the National Trust.
Production photography Lizzie Coombes and Joel Chester Fildes / National Theatre Wales.
Check that teeth sit squarely:
At birth ‒ milk teeth – Dannedd sugno
12 months – 2 teeth – Dau Ddant
24 months – 4 teeth – Pedwar dant
36 months – 6 teeth – “Full Mouth” ‒ Ceg llawn
Older – “Broken Mouth” – “Last Teeth”
Check that teeth sit squarely:
At birth ‒ milk teeth – Dannedd sugno
12 months – 2 teeth – Dau Ddant
24 months – 4 teeth – Pedwar dant
36 months – 6 teeth – “Full Mouth” ‒ Ceg llawn
Older – “Broken Mouth” – “Last Teeth”
The womb's warm room
where the lamb grows in its cradle.
In the blood-lit cave
life becomes lamb,
limbs budding in the warm dark,
multiplying and dividing cells
ova, zygote, embryo, foetus,
developing muscle, bone,
a force unstoppable
as the river
in the mountain's womb.
The womb's warm room
where the lamb grows in its cradle.
In the blood-lit cave
life becomes lamb,
limbs budding in the warm dark,
multiplying and dividing cells
ova, zygote, embryo, foetus,
developing muscle, bone,
a force unstoppable
as the river
in the mountain's womb.
Is this birth, or death?
How can she lick this corpse to life,
love's chemistry raging
in her blood, her brain?
She will try, obseesed.
She drinks it, smells it.
It is hers this death in birth.
She thirst for her lamb, still-born, still warm,
licks him clean with a growl of love.
Is this birth, or death?
How can she lick this corpse to life,
love's chemistry raging
in her blood, her brain?
She will try, obseesed.
She drinks it, smells it.
It is hers this death in birth.
She thirst for her lamb, still-born, still warm,
licks him clean with a growl of love.
The one thousand five hundered and fifty Welsh Mountain ewes of Hafod y Llan are made up of four flocks:
600 here at Cwmllan,
280 at Bwlch,
320 at Gelli Iago and Cnicht,
350 at Pistyll.
The one thousand five hundered and fifty Welsh Mountain ewes of Hafod y Llan are made up of four flocks:
600 here at Cwmllan,
280 at Bwlch,
320 at Gelli Iago and Cnicht,
350 at Pistyll.
The womb clenches like a heart
against the void as they wait,
weighted, for a journey.
Branded barren. Emty.
Hollow on the holy hill,
without foetus withour future.
She must meave the mountain,
the end of the line,
the last cord cut.
The womb clenches like a heart
against the void as they wait,
weighted, for a journey.
Branded barren. Emty.
Hollow on the holy hill,
without foetus withour future.
She must meave the mountain,
the end of the line,
the last cord cut.
Production photos by Lizzie Coombes and Joe Fildes/NTW.
Extracts of poem written by Gillian Clarke for The Gathering. Copyright Gillian Clarke.
Additional texts by Louise Ann Wilson.
Production photos by Lizzie Coombes and Joe Fildes/NTW.
Extracts of poem written by Gillian Clarke for The Gathering. Copyright Gillian Clarke.
Additional texts by Louise Ann Wilson.
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Audience Responses
I want to sincerely thank and congratulate everyone involved in making Saturday one of the most lovely, amazing, emotive days of my life.
It was a wonderful experience and I've spent 48 hours trying to find the right words of appreciation. I can't, I keep welling up as all the amazing images come to mind and my vocabulary doesn't match them. So my sincere but inadequate thanks will have to do. Thank you.
As it crosses my mind, various little scenes are connecting up and making a bigger and bigger picture. I absolutely love it, great value too, been round the route 4 times in my head.
Felt that the whole area was laid out like it was long ago so that you could come along now and put on this piece of work. Inch perfect. Praise for the set designer. The music, the band, the school kids, connections with the past, connections with the future, all on a working farm... Thanks.
... an extraordinarily beautiful and moving show.
Wonderful event. Amazing. Stunning. Challenging.
As a farm girl myself, I thought The Gathering by NTW was amazing today. Our ordinary lives being shown as a piece of art. Very special indeed.
What a great experience it was to be part of The Gathering. The creative team, cast and production crew had put together a truly unique experience that to my layman’s view was promenade theatre at its best. As well as being educational, I certainly learned a lot about sheep farming, it was an all-round provocative, immersive and sensory experience; the powerful and passionate acting performances; the shepherds working the dogs and the dogs working the sheep; the melancholy music from the band reverberating around the mountains; the many visual installations on the way up and down; the red scar on the tramway; the surrogate sheep video; the sheep shearing; I could go on… and of course the weather was perfect.
I thoroughly enjoyed the whole day and left to go back to my world with very positive and lasting impressions.
I really want to say is how amazed I was at the performance, it was absolutely brilliant and an unforgettable experience. The red carpet, the wool in the old farmstead, the bed in the middle of mining barracks, and the impressive nature of what must be the best natural amphitheatre at such a grand scale (in the context of the brass band in a circle when we started our descent). [...] Congratulations. It was a wonderful event that was enjoyed by so many. The weather was a huge contributory factor, and I am thankful for that as it made the experience so much richer.
Where to start… ? I knew it would be good. I was looking forward to it for ages. I thought I knew what to expect. Thank you for blowing all of that apart - along with my preconceptions.
The Gathering continues to invade my everyday with constant flashbacks to our time on that mountain … I think it will be doing that for a long while. Such depth of thought on so many levels must surely take time to comprehend? The walk alone was worth the ticket fee, the opportunity to be in that place, surrounded by others also searching/looking/feeling was so very emotional in many many ways. [...] I just wanted to congratulate and applaud all involved in the entire experience. The efforts must have been extreme at times but they produced a piece so rich and rewarding I hope they are all as pleased as I was entranced.
Things come into my head all of the time … the barn. The triptych. The straw. Was it the lamb of God we were witnessing in that footage? (Whatever that is… ?). Not sure.
Thanks for giving so much.
Audience Responses
I want to sincerely thank and congratulate everyone involved in making Saturday one of the most lovely, amazing, emotive days of my life.
It was a wonderful experience and I've spent 48 hours trying to find the right words of appreciation. I can't, I keep welling up as all the amazing images come to mind and my vocabulary doesn't match them. So my sincere but inadequate thanks will have to do. Thank you.
As it crosses my mind, various little scenes are connecting up and making a bigger and bigger picture. I absolutely love it, great value too, been round the route 4 times in my head.
Felt that the whole area was laid out like it was long ago so that you could come along now and put on this piece of work. Inch perfect. Praise for the set designer. The music, the band, the school kids, connections with the past, connections with the future, all on a working farm... Thanks.
... an extraordinarily beautiful and moving show.
Wonderful event. Amazing. Stunning. Challenging.
As a farm girl myself, I thought The Gathering by NTW was amazing today. Our ordinary lives being shown as a piece of art. Very special indeed.
What a great experience it was to be part of The Gathering. The creative team, cast and production crew had put together a truly unique experience that to my layman’s view was promenade theatre at its best. As well as being educational, I certainly learned a lot about sheep farming, it was an all-round provocative, immersive and sensory experience; the powerful and passionate acting performances; the shepherds working the dogs and the dogs working the sheep; the melancholy music from the band reverberating around the mountains; the many visual installations on the way up and down; the red scar on the tramway; the surrogate sheep video; the sheep shearing; I could go on… and of course the weather was perfect.
I thoroughly enjoyed the whole day and left to go back to my world with very positive and lasting impressions.
I really want to say is how amazed I was at the performance, it was absolutely brilliant and an unforgettable experience. The red carpet, the wool in the old farmstead, the bed in the middle of mining barracks, and the impressive nature of what must be the best natural amphitheatre at such a grand scale (in the context of the brass band in a circle when we started our descent). [...] Congratulations. It was a wonderful event that was enjoyed by so many. The weather was a huge contributory factor, and I am thankful for that as it made the experience so much richer.
Where to start… ? I knew it would be good. I was looking forward to it for ages. I thought I knew what to expect. Thank you for blowing all of that apart - along with my preconceptions.
The Gathering continues to invade my everyday with constant flashbacks to our time on that mountain … I think it will be doing that for a long while. Such depth of thought on so many levels must surely take time to comprehend? The walk alone was worth the ticket fee, the opportunity to be in that place, surrounded by others also searching/looking/feeling was so very emotional in many many ways. [...] I just wanted to congratulate and applaud all involved in the entire experience. The efforts must have been extreme at times but they produced a piece so rich and rewarding I hope they are all as pleased as I was entranced.
Things come into my head all of the time … the barn. The triptych. The straw. Was it the lamb of God we were witnessing in that footage? (Whatever that is… ?). Not sure.
Thanks for giving so much.
John Gruffydd Williams born 1856 married Mary Williams.
They bought HYL in 1902.
Children were David Owen Williams (D.O), John and another who drowned whilst still a boy.
D. O. married Rosina Ellen Williams.
Children were Myra Rosina, Prys Henry Owen, Ann Margaretta.
Rosina died in childbirth aged 24.
Prys married Lily Innett Wiliams (Lil).
Children were Dafydd Malldwyn, Bleddyn Rhys and Rhian Gwenno who was born in April 1950 on the day the Swallows returned, two weeks after her grandfather (D.O) died.
John Gruffydd Williams born 1856 married Mary Williams.
They bought HYL in 1902.
Children were David Owen Williams (D.O), John and another who drowned whilst still a boy.
D. O. married Rosina Ellen Williams.
Children were Myra Rosina, Prys Henry Owen, Ann Margaretta.
Rosina died in childbirth aged 24.
Prys married Lily Innett Wiliams (Lil).
Children were Dafydd Malldwyn, Bleddyn Rhys and Rhian Gwenno who was born in April 1950 on the day the Swallows returned, two weeks after her grandfather (D.O) died.
Design
Production Design - Storyboards, Maps and Costumes
Production Design - Storyboards, Maps and Costumes
Flag Designs based on historic Hafod Y Llan earmarkings
Right ear – Torri blaen a hollti – cut the front and cut a split
Left ear – Cnwyad – v notch at the tip of the ear
Flag Designs based on historic Hafod Y Llan earmarkings
Right ear – Torri blaen a hollti – cut the front and cut a split
Left ear – Cnwyad – v notch at the tip of the ear
The Mountain
The Mountain
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The Farm
The Farm
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Costume Designs
Costume Designs
Research
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When John McGrath asked me to develop a performance work for National Theatre Wales, I was creating Fissure, a three-day long walking-performance in the Yorkshire Dales, and had become fascinated with sheep farming and its processes. Since my work is driven by a desire to explore key life events, I became particularly interested in ways in which sheep farming could explore issues of fertility and infertility, motherhood and non-motherhood. This is what I set out to do in The Gathering / Yr Helfa.
The production evolved from a three-year long period of studying the life and reproductive cycles of the ewes at Hafod y Llan, 'a true' Snowdonian upland sheep farm.
It was an immense privilege to work with National Theatre Wales, Arwyn Owen the National Trust Farm Manager at Hafod y Llan, the shepherds, Bleddyn Williams, the Deiniolen Band, and many other individuals and groups. My aim was that the experience of The Gathering Yr Helfa would give participants a deep sense of the uniqueness of the place, its people, the animals and the landscape in which it was created and performed, and in so doing revealed something that they did not know before hand.
When John McGrath asked me to develop a performance work for National Theatre Wales, I was creating Fissure, a three-day long walking-performance in the Yorkshire Dales, and had become fascinated with sheep farming and its processes. Since my work is driven by a desire to explore key life events, I became particularly interested in ways in which sheep farming could explore issues of fertility and infertility, motherhood and non-motherhood. This is what I set out to do in The Gathering / Yr Helfa.
The production evolved from a three-year long period of studying the life and reproductive cycles of the ewes at Hafod y Llan, 'a true' Snowdonian upland sheep farm.
It was an immense privilege to work with National Theatre Wales, Arwyn Owen the National Trust Farm Manager at Hafod y Llan, the shepherds, Bleddyn Williams, the Deiniolen Band, and many other individuals and groups. My aim was that the experience of The Gathering Yr Helfa would give participants a deep sense of the uniqueness of the place, its people, the animals and the landscape in which it was created and performed, and in so doing revealed something that they did not know before hand.
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Annual Cycle of the ewes
Medi. September
In September all sheep are gathered off the mountain.
“Gather everything off the hill!”
200 Cwmllan “broken mouthed” “draft” ewes that would struggle in upland conditions are sold at Dolgellau Market
to lowland farms where they continue to breed; when they can’t, they are slaughtered for meat.
Mis-Hydref. October.
Wean the lambs.
Split them into groups.
Spray the winter “pitch mark”: red, orange, green.
Winter 400 ewe lambs in Porthmadog, Pwllheli, Bryncir.
Tachwedd. November.
Sheep are seasonal breeders.
Ewes ovulate with fading light.
On 1st November: Ewes “have” rams.
Ewes “take” rams, Rams “serve” ewes.
Rams “run” with ewes, Rams “tup” ewes
Rhagfyr. December
Gestation takes 5 months:
Day 1 to 3: Fertilization.
Day 10 to 16: Blastocyst elongates from sphere to tubular form.
Day 20 to 24: Embryo implants in uterine wall.
Day 35-100: Wool follicles form.
Day 100: 70% of fetal growth has occurred.
Day 152: Birth.
Ionawr. January
“Kempy” coarse fleeces protect ewes from driving rain.
100 inches of rain in the valley.
150 inches of rain on the summits.
Chwefror. February
In the second week in February ewes are scanned and marked:
No mark: single.
Blue mark: twins.
Separate mark: triplets.
Black mark: empty.
Mawrth. March
Shepherding.
Ebrill. April
This year 680 lambs were born to 640 Hafod y Llan ewes.
80 twins and 600 singles.
If a lamb is still-born, taken by a fox or dies, the ewe is given a surrogate.
15 Cwmllan lambs were thus adopted.
Mai. May
Ewes and lambs are sent to the mountain.
Before they are “turned up” all lambs are marked with ear cuts to show they belong to the farm and a particular flock.
The ewes of Cwmllan have:
Right ear – cut the front and cut a split – Torri blaen a hollti
Left ear – V-notch at the tip of the ear – Cnwyad
Mehefin. June
Cynefin: the inter-generational memory of a place passed from mother to lamb.
They are “taught” the boundaries. The sheep “know” their place.
Gorffenaf. July.
1,000 sheep sheared in a day.
Wool used for carpets not jumpers.
“It is torture next to the skin!”
Awst. August
Quiet Time
Annual Cycle of the ewes
Medi. September
In September all sheep are gathered off the mountain.
“Gather everything off the hill!”
200 Cwmllan “broken mouthed” “draft” ewes that would struggle in upland conditions are sold at Dolgellau Market
to lowland farms where they continue to breed; when they can’t, they are slaughtered for meat.
Mis-Hydref. October.
Wean the lambs.
Split them into groups.
Spray the winter “pitch mark”: red, orange, green.
Winter 400 ewe lambs in Porthmadog, Pwllheli, Bryncir.
Tachwedd. November.
Sheep are seasonal breeders.
Ewes ovulate with fading light.
On 1st November: Ewes “have” rams.
Ewes “take” rams, Rams “serve” ewes.
Rams “run” with ewes, Rams “tup” ewes
Rhagfyr. December
Gestation takes 5 months:
Day 1 to 3: Fertilization.
Day 10 to 16: Blastocyst elongates from sphere to tubular form.
Day 20 to 24: Embryo implants in uterine wall.
Day 35-100: Wool follicles form.
Day 100: 70% of fetal growth has occurred.
Day 152: Birth.
Ionawr. January
“Kempy” coarse fleeces protect ewes from driving rain.
100 inches of rain in the valley.
150 inches of rain on the summits.
Chwefror. February
In the second week in February ewes are scanned and marked:
No mark: single.
Blue mark: twins.
Separate mark: triplets.
Black mark: empty.
Mawrth. March
Shepherding.
Ebrill. April
This year 680 lambs were born to 640 Hafod y Llan ewes.
80 twins and 600 singles.
If a lamb is still-born, taken by a fox or dies, the ewe is given a surrogate.
15 Cwmllan lambs were thus adopted.
Mai. May
Ewes and lambs are sent to the mountain.
Before they are “turned up” all lambs are marked with ear cuts to show they belong to the farm and a particular flock.
The ewes of Cwmllan have:
Right ear – cut the front and cut a split – Torri blaen a hollti
Left ear – V-notch at the tip of the ear – Cnwyad
Mehefin. June
Cynefin: the inter-generational memory of a place passed from mother to lamb.
They are “taught” the boundaries. The sheep “know” their place.
Gorffenaf. July.
1,000 sheep sheared in a day.
Wool used for carpets not jumpers.
“It is torture next to the skin!”
Awst. August
Quiet Time
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