- Research and Development:
To inform the development I visited the Botanical gardens near my house and had a ook at water features. I was most struck by the ones in the Japanese garden that were simply water flowing into a rock. The vibe and sound were lovely and relaxing. There was no overspill however there were pebbles beneath to disperse the water and avoid a puddle beneath the fountain.
I processed the ash, clay and rocks/pebbles I had collected while at Trawtha Makuminya into fine powders with which to make glazes. I then first some text tiles and did a triaxial blend of the kind that Ben had shown me with the material we harvested from the northeast. The glazes made were very earthy (of course!). The textures varied from very fine and shiny to very course and rocky. All were chocolate brown/deep red and some had speckles of black or a lighter yellow colour. I was very happy that these glaze tests produced promising results and decided to use solely native harvested glazes from Trawtha for this work without the addition of any commercial materials.
Creating these works started with the water – the river – the journey up the river to the wayalina and knowing I wanted the forms to be able to hold something and be closely tied to water – remembering that a sound needs to be produced in some way.
The form was refined through experimentation while on the residency as well as inspiration from working with ceramicist Ben Richardson from Ridgeline pottery. We decided that the forms would be ‘bowl/vessel’ shapes that are shaped by draping/bashing/pushing the clay over rocks beside the river. The first of these forms was created next to the Nive river outside the hut. It was a particularly beautiful bowl.
I made three or four of these while at the residency there and bisque fired them in my studio – during this firing the largest exploded while the others remained.
The others Armie and I made together by taking large thick slabs of clay, placing them over interesting rocks of various sizes and bashing them with our hands and smaller rocks until the clay spread over the rock and a bowl was formed. We went for very organic edges. Tears and holes were encouraged, as was the texture from whatever we were bashing.
- Making the Final Piece
In total 19 bowls were made. Their sizes ranged from the size that could be cupped between your hands to much larger, almost 46cm in diameter.
I chose an arrangement that would have three larger bowls in the centre. These would be formed and placed close enough together to allow water from the largest to spill into the second two. I plotted the placement of the smaller pieces to correspond with the flow of the river in the direction of the Wayalina from our residency base at the hut.
Again, during firing the two largest /the centrepieces of this these exploded and would need to be reformed. This seemed to be due to their sheer size and thickness – we had not let them dry long enough (even though it had been a whole month – we learnt for next time).
All the remaining pieces were glazed with five of the glazes made from combinations of material harvested from trawtha during the residnecy (ash, clay and rock in varying combinations).
- The arrangement and display
The arrangement was chosen to reflect the path of river from a birds-eye view. The centrepieces corresponding to where we stayed during our time there. We were able to refine the positioning of each of the bowls using the studio space at good grief and the sketch of the river’s path. I liked presenting them low to the ground. The whole instillation took up around 3m in length and 1.2 width.
- Planning the Activation
It may be because I always am so surrounded by culture when at Trawtha or because the residency occurred just after a community ceremony, or maybe because of the cultural significance of the heritage and cultural resources in the area that this work was informed by, but I associate this work and its corresponding activation with ‘ceremony’.
- Could be them being carried in a placed down in particular way
- Could be gonged or scraped
- Could be placing something in them that makes the noise
- Mixing ochre in the bowls also worked