We Will Sing is the first major work created by Hamilton in the UK for more than 30 years, and the first time all three spaces on the vast top floor of Salts Mill have been combined to present a single artwork.

Salts Mill opened in 1853 as the most modern mill in Europe, and now forms the heart of the UNESCO World Heritage Site of Saltaire. Hamilton’s work is inspired by the history and the regeneration of this former textile mill, by the local contemporary wool and textile manufacturing industries, and by the people and communities who call the district home.

We Will Sing is a work of memory and imagining. Drawing on the origins of the textile processes that once filled this huge space, Hamilton’s site-responsive installation weaves together voice, song and printed word in a material surround made from raw and woven wool sourced from local textile companies H Dawson, based at Salts Mill, and William Halstead, which celebrates its 150th anniversary in 2025.

Curated by June Hill and Jennifer Hallam, We Will Sing features vocal and music collaborations with Emily Eagen and a new film created by Bradford-based filmmaker Ali Lycett that contextualises Hamilton’s practice and documents the making of the installation. A major engagement programme includes tours, readings, special events and an open invitation for us all to write a letter to the future, addressing the question at the heart of We Will Sing: What does the future need to know?

Produced & Directed by Ali Lycett
Director of Photography Tom Diffenthal
Editor Lauren Dowling

We Will Sing in Salts Mill is open from Wednesday to Sunday, and closed on Monday and Tuesday.

Salts Mill is open most bank holiday Mondays. Please check the Salts Mill website for the most up to date seasonal opening times including school holiday hours.

Ann Hamilton is internationally acclaimed for her large-scale multimedia installations, public projects and performance collaborations. Her site-responsive process works with common materials to invoke particular places, collective voices and communities of labour. Based in Columbus, Ohio, Hamilton has previously represented the USA at the São Paulo Biennale and the Venice Biennale, and has exhibited extensively around the world – including major commissions for the Park Avenue Armory, the Guggenheim Museum and the Museum of Modern Art in New York; the Musée d’art contemporain in Lyon; the Art Institute of Chicago; and Tate Liverpool.

Hamilton is inviting us all to write a Letter to the Future, connecting our memories of the past and what we love about the present to tomorrow’s world and the people who’ll live in it. What do you think the future needs to know? What would you share with it, and what could you teach it?

Watch an invitation from Ann Hamilton below and submit your letter to the future.