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<\/figure>\n\n\n\nA British Guide to the End of the World<\/em><\/a>\u00a0came about after a TV producer heard Newcastle University researcher\u00a0Michael Mulvihill<\/a>\u00a0speaking about his thesis, which looks at how creative arts can investigate the effects of the nuclear deterrent on society. The Arena film begins with Operation Grapple – a series of British thermonuclear bomb tests that took place in the south Pacific islands between 1957 and 1958. It offers unique access to footage, some of it which was previously classified, from ex-military personnel who filmed their arrival on Christmas Island to carry out these tests. The Cold War period has preoccupied him for years. As a child in the 1980s, he would time how fast he could run home from primary school in case the four minute warning, telling of impending nuclear attack, ever sounded. It took him six minutes.
Michael was at a series of workshops organised by the\u00a0Arts and Humanities Research Council\u2019s<\/a>\u00a0Northern Bridge Doctoral Training Partnership<\/a>\u00a0when he was asked to pitch his thesis to a group of television producers.
Now, he is an associate producer on the 80 minute film which is directed by BAFTA winner Dan Vernon and produced by award winning production company Erica Starling Productions. It is being broadcast as part of a Cold War season on BBC Four, timed to coincide with 30 years since the fall of the Berlin Wall.
\u201cIt is really amazing to see over four years of research come to life in this film,\u201d says Michael, an interdisciplinary researcher from the University\u2019s\u00a0School of Arts and Cultures<\/a>\u00a0and\u00a0School of Geography, Politics and Sociology<\/a>. \u201cObjects that had been just archive items have been given voices. It\u2019s quite an amazing experience.\u201d
<\/p>\n\n\n\nOperation Grapple<\/h2>\n\n\n\n
It then shows how over succeeding decades the British authorities tried to plan for the prospect of nuclear war reaching these shores – a devastating event that never happened. Long neglected broadcasts from news and government sources reveal a time when paranoia was stockpiled, leaving a generation traumatised.
\u201cI think the film dramatically shows how the authorities struggled to conceive a system civil defence against a weapon of incredible power,\u201d says Michael. \u201cWeapons that still pose a threat today.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\nThe Unblinking Eye<\/h2>\n\n\n\n
Decades on, his fears of war between the East and West have informed his PhD in Fine Art and Geography. And as well as the documentary, his academic research led to him becoming the first ever artist-in-residence at RAF Fylingdales<\/a> in North Yorkshire – the UK early warning system where the four minute warning would be signalled. The residency led to a large scale museum exhibition.
\u201cThe Cold War was something that felt very real when I was growing up,\u201c he says. \u201cThirty years on, a lot of people have forgotten what that period felt like, that underlying fear that the world may be on the brink of nuclear war at any time.\u201d
The exhibition at Whitby Museum, The Unblinking Eye:<\/em> 55 Years of Space Operations on Fylingdales Moor,<\/em> makes public for the first time previously unseen objects from the station alongside new artworks by Mulvihill. It also presents new research on the history of RAF Fylingdales in local, national and international contexts, highlighting the North York Moors’ integral role in international space monitoring and the cultural legacy of the iconic ‘golf balls’.<\/p>\n\n\n\n