Journey
Journey is a sculptural artwork, featuring over 3000 train tickets – each one representing a journey, a person and a story. Sewn together, they become a larger statement exploring ideas of connection, belonging and humanity.
From January to July 2024, Beth collected train tickets from across the UK and spent several days working at Middlesbrough railway station, engaging with staff and station users. She gathered tickets from many travellers passing through the station, striking up conversations about their journeys and discovering what brought them to Middlesbrough from across the world. The coloured threads used to bind the tickets together recall the old Edmondson railway tickets, which came in a number of different colours and were used on the rail system until the mid 1980s.
Journey was displayed in Middlesbrough Train Station between September 2024 and March 2025.
Journey was commissioned for Middlesbrough’s Most Creative Station - a project delivered by Navigator North as members of Middlesbrough Cultural Partnership, and supported through The Cultural Development Fund, a Department for Digital, Culture, Media and Sport (DCMS) fund administered by Arts Council England.
Blank Canvas
Blank Canvas was a large-scale interactive art installation commissioned by ARC Stockton for the 2022 Stockton International Riverside Festival. Artists Beth Johnson and Claire Harrison transformed the former Spencer Market site, now demolished as part of Stockton’s Riverside redevelopment, into a vibrant, open creative space.
Described by the artists as '“a collaborative opportunity to reimagine the future of town centres,” Blank Canvas explored how communities might reclaim shared public spaces as retail increasingly moves online. Situated beside the river, the one constant throughout Stockton’s changing landscape, the installation reflected on the transition between the old and new shape of the town. The roofs of the market stalls were mirrored to reflect the site’s distinctive brutalist ceiling decoration, while a large suspended mobile, created from perspex, a material invented in Stockton, echoed the colour, light, and movement of the River Tees.
Festival audiences were invited to contribute directly to the evolving artwork by sharing memories of the past and hopes for the future, creating a collective portrait of community, change, and possibility.
LIGHT:space Art Trail
Light:Space was a COVID-safe public art trail created by Wild Vision Collective in Stockton-on-Tees in 2021. Developed during the national lockdown, the project transformed empty shop windows in Wellington Square and the windows of ARC into illuminated exhibition spaces featuring artworks based on light, movement, and video. The trail was designed so people could safely experience art while walking through the town centre for exercise or essential shopping during the pandemic.
The project aimed to create a sense of hope and positivity during a period marked by fear and isolation. The project received £1,000 funding after winning ARC Stockton’s “Pizza and Pitches” community arts initiative.
An open call invited artists to submit work responding to the themes of light and connection, resulting in installations by 13 artists displayed across seven shop windows and ARC’s building in Stockton town centre. Visitors could also vote for their favourite artwork, with a public prize awarded as part of the exhibition. Alongside the physical trail, a virtual online tour made the exhibition accessible to audiences unable to attend in person.
Light:Space reflected broader efforts to reimagine Stockton’s high street during and after COVID-19 by using vacant retail spaces for cultural and community activity. The project demonstrated how public art could encourage connection, creativity, and civic engagement at a time when many traditional galleries and venues remained closed.
