#hidden lives

From Luke

From Leia

(a fragment from a longer work)

There had been a name before the one she wore now.

A real one. One that belonged to her.

Before cameras. Before fame. Before people said it like they knew her.

Before television carried her into living rooms she would never enter. Before it meant something to strangers.

She tried to think of her name.

Not the sound the world made. Not the shape written on posters and contracts and glowing signs. Something older. Something softer.

A name surfaced in her mind, soft and unexpected.

Anne.

It felt like stepping barefoot into warm earth.

They’re round and brown

Like amber

Shooter marble size

and dead or dying

I have never seen one out in the wild,

doing bug things

playing a bug song

or a bug game.

I only see them dead or capsized

on the patio, tiny legs

pitifully waving or done waving

in the air.

You turn them over and they walk a step

and roll over again

wave feebly

and die.

Surely they must have

a life

where they

play

eat

love

grow up

have a little

bug society

a bug scout troop

bug songs

bug rodeos

But I only see them in

their final

sad moments.

I am sorry and I want to save them.

I never saw one happily

pursuing bug interests.

It’s June

and they’re dying again.

All over the patio.

One day there were none,

not in the trees

or marching down the sidewalk

or rustling in the garden

Just showing up

to flip over

and die.

I wish I had seen them

at the bug prom.

Tuesday, July 6, 2021

2. Group Work, ‘Beneath the Surface’

This work happened in October of 2019.

Working with a group of Young Carers (YC), this project considered ways of looking deeper into places. The YC had already chosen Skara Brae as a place they wanted to investigate. I evolved my metalwork ideas to include casting on the beach, and clay and other making, in the replica house at Skara Brae. Part of the remit was to promote imaginative thinking about how life would have been at the time. It also quickly became apparent that the social opportunities of shared time were very important to this group. The replica house was a great place to be able to help the imagination along. Equally, cooking breakfast on the beach, and meeting up with another group of young people, and being able to show them how to blowtorch etc, whilst we all had breakfast on the beach, were really valuable opportunities for connection and self confidence.

I’ve taken on this model of working, and want to extend it to include students at college in a shared workshop of some kind. The YC are keen archaeologists, and with the help of some Lottery funding, I’m currently trying to figure out how we will manage this later in 2020

I haven’t included many images here for confidentiality reasons. This project became a pop up exhibition at the end of 2019, and is currently on tour.