I don’t believe it is a common thing for people to think about what their name means. Rather than sift through the speculated and varied connotations on the internet, it is much easier to define the meaning of my name with personal experiences and personality attributes in mind. The meaning, to me at least, (artwork like this could dispense individual meanings for different members of an audience) is a journey from a period in my life where I was unhappy with something (my name) and then moved on from that with age to what I would call a place of acceptance and peace with the name itself. It begins with the school yard setting, then using the idea of the name Ashley for a male coming into the spotlight with the 1939 film Gone With The Wind, I took the sound of wind to identify the beginning of the acceptance stage. The use of Johnny Cash’s “A Boy Named Sue” echoing out is used for the songs literal meaning and the fact Johnny Cash is one of the first people I can remember who taught me to just be who you are. The wind then merges into a crowd recording of a very recent Bruce Springsteen concert I was at, someone else I’m also inspired by. This build-up of the crowd is the celebration of acceptance with something and then for a brief period at the end there is the quiet sounds of my backyard signifying coming to peace with the name itself.  The use of geophony and anthrophony sounds are the makeup of this recording. 

Ash Mcfadyen