FIFTEEN CYCLES OF THE SUN: A RETROSPECTIVE
A major retrospective celebrating one and a half decades of sonic archaeology, esoteric publishing, and the art of the uncanny — presented in partnership with the Museum of British Folklore and Field System.
Fifteen Cycles of the Sun: A Retrospective, an exhibition celebrating fifteen years of one of Britain’s most singular and quietly radical cultural enterprises. Opening in June, the exhibition will occupy the Field System gallery space, offering the most comprehensive survey of Folklore Tapes’ work ever assembled.
Since its founding in 2010, Folklore Tapes has occupied a space entirely its own — part archive, part art collective, part magical act. Born from a fascination with Britain’s layered landscape of custom, legend, and living memory, the project has produced an extraordinary body of work: handcrafted cassette releases and vinyl albums, artist publications, field recordings, visual art, film, and ritual performance, all united by a commitment to encountering the old, the strange, and the persistently overlooked.
Fifteen Cycles of the Sun, draws together the full arc of this remarkable project: original tape artwork and packaging, archival photography, specially made musical instruments, maps, artist films, and a significant selection of objects gathered or commissioned over the course of the label’s life. Visitors will be invited to trace the evolution of Folklore Tapes from its earliest releases — limited editions that circulated quietly among devotees of hauntology, psychogeography, and experimental music — through to its most ambitious collaborative and geographical projects, which have taken the collective deep into fenland, moorland, coastline, and urban edge. Field System, in collaboration with the Museum of British Folklore, itself a custodian of the material and intangible heritage of British folk life, have put together the exhibition along with David Chatton Barker, founder of Folklore Tapes. Exhibition runs from June 2nd to June 21st 2026 at Field System, East Street, Ashburton, Devon, TQ13 7AH
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