Coil of Days is a live performance, film and series of seven sonic sculptures created in 2018-19 by Rita Evans.

Coil of Days by Rita Evans was exhibited at Tate St Ives, 3 February – 3 May 2022 as part of her exhibition of Stringing the Matrix Tate St Ives commission. Coil of Days was premiered at Towner International Biennial exhibition of contemporary art at Towner Eastbourne in October 2020 – April 2021. It was selected by Polly Staple (Director of Collection, British Art, Tate), artist Mike Nelson, and Noelle Collins (Exhibitions & Offsite Curator, Towner Eastbourne). In Coil of Days, a series of collaborations unfold around eight sonic sculptures and instruments. In the performance and film, we unfurl the sonic spaces of the sensitive instruments playing and working them as our shared tools. In the first scene, Chapter 1, Bated Breath, we introduce The Realm of Openings. In Chapter 2, Communal Breath, our playing of the Aqueous Spine vertebrate instrument creates liquid sounds that connect us. Breath condensation transforms the pitch of the flutes in the Sphinx instrument as it is played, the tone of which was adjusted by the opening and closing of doors in the instrument’s body. In Chapter 3, An Evolutionary Remnant, we used the light bow and heavy rock instruments to propagate and root us in our newly established landscape. In Chapter 6, The Thinking Reed, we play manifold reeded pipes to sample and filter the air as one multi-limbed being. In Chapter 7, Trefoil, our triangular instrument with tremolo arms, creates geometric shapes and pitch-shifting sounds that play out in our negotiations. Finally, in Chapter 8, The Instinctive Unfolding, we tessellate our bodies around the metal diamond instrument. In the film, memorandums written by Amy Lay-Pettifer in response to each instrument are read by eight women and blended into the audiovisual compositions. Amy also reads the voice of artist and occultist Ithell Colquhoun in the film. The memorandums are based on the personal and tactile nature of our work. The performance was choreographed by Pepa Ubera.