A poster for No Spinoza and Nick Walters’ exhibition The Wisdom Of The Desert
YORK arts collective Navigators Art will bring together two multi-media artists for The Wisdom Of The Desert, an exhibition of film, sound and sculpture in the historic Red Tower, Foss Islands Road, York, on November 7 and 8.
No Spinoza (Thomas Pearson) and Nick Walters share an interest in the symbolism of found materials and the mystical traditions of the wilderness. Assembling a range of new work, they will create an immersive, provocative, multi-sensory experience.
Honey has long been revered by ancient desert cultures as a life-giving substance, associated with ideas of rebirth and immortality. Famously, Saint John the Baptist is said to have survived alone on a diet of wild honey and locusts.
Nick Walters’ Honey Dipper: Passing electrical current through honey to create mysterious and ever-changing textures of sound
Walters’ Honey Dipper (2026) passes electrical current through the material to create mysterious and ever-changing textures of sound. Ex-voto (2026), a series of small sculptures set in niches in the tower walls, alludes to beeswax votive statues placed in shrines as a gesture of gratitude and devotion.
No Spinoza presents Jupiter’s Great Hurricane (2026), a cycle of experimental music and film that broadly explores themes of temptation, progress and inheritance. Various references are made to desert spirituality, including the words of Saint Anthony the Great, the father of Christian monasticism.
The work broadens out to consider blood, stars, sub-atomic particles and the geopolitical importance of oil. The videos accompany an album of music and a book of essays that will be available to buy at the exhibition.
Thomas Pearson aka No Spinoza
The work of north eastern artist Thomas Pearson (No Spinoza) spans music, poetry and film, linked by themes including folklore, industrial heritage and postmodernism in art and architecture. He exhibited at the Royal Academy of Arts, London, in 2018 and the National Poetry Library, Southbank Centre, London, in 2023 and created a large-scale solo poetry/sculpture installation in the marshland of RSPB Saltholme, Middlesbrough, in 2019. (2019).
He is a widely published writer and was long-listed for the 2025 National Poetry Competition. His music has been featured on BBC Radio 6 Music and live in session on BBC Radio York.
York mixed-media artist Nick Walters combines recycled materials and found objects with technology to create interactive and immersive projects, installations and sculptures.
Nick Walters’ Ex-voto: Small sculptures set in niches in the tower walls, alluding to beeswax votive statues placed in shrines as a gesture of gratitude and devotion
His past exhibitions include HOPE: Shadow and Light (2023) in the Bar Convent Living Heritage Centre chapel in York, in partnership with York arts charity New Visuality, and Soundscaping (2026) at the National Centre for Early Music in York and at Greenbelt Festival.
Sited on York’s medieval City Walls to the east of the city centre, the Red Tower dates originally from 1490, although the present building was restored heavily in the Victorian period. Built as a watchtower, when the area to the north was a flooded lake known as the King’s Fishpool, today the tower is a charity-run community hub.
No Spinoza (Thomas Pearson) and Nick Walters present The Wisdom Of The Desert, The Red Tower, Foss Islands Road, York, November 7, 6pm to 9pm, and November 8, 1pm to 4pm.
Another poster for No Spinoza and Nick Walters’ exhibition at the Red Tower