Can you start by giving us an overview of your practice and what led you to explore the intersection of ecology, ethnography, mysticism, and care? 

My practice is currently concerned with remediating a modern relationship to ecology while exploring the evolving notions of spirituality, often linked to place. I reflect my findings and ideas around these topics through various, amalgamated mediums, usually aiming to construct installations which can embrace someone into a meditative space. 

I have always been fascinated by ancient traditions and cross-cultural practices – constantly searching for the small things that intrinsically link humans from different ages and places. My conceptual explorations were most notably influenced by philosophers Deleuze and  Guattari, as well as artists Ottobong Nkanga and Wolfgang Laib at the start of my Fine Arts degree. Something that stood out to me was perspectives which shift the role of the artist, or human, into a more collaborative and neutral position. The awareness of being one fragment of a larger natural system really resonated with my thinking, and my artistic practice at its core seems to revolve around the power of empathy and connection. 

Your statement mentions that a sense of terrestrial divinity is integral to your work;  you seek to reveal the imperfect symmetry that reverberates throughout the forms in the physical plane. Can you expand a bit on this line of thought? 

In my most present moments in the natural world, I can more clearly sense a divine network weaving through my surroundings, peaking through the physical to a transcendent plane.  There is a glowing, warm, familiar feeling to this web, a sort of metaphysical awareness that I  am constantly in pursuit of. Visually it is mostly symmetrical, fluctuating and expansive. I  notice a synchronistic connection to this network in the imperfect symmetry of the human anatomy, in the cross-section of fruits, the antlers of a deer, the roots of a tree, etc. So much of the natural world materialises in dualities, and honouring these physical examples, no matter how mundane or commonplace, becomes a sacred daily act of mindfulness. 

Could you elaborate on the significance of sacred encounters in the natural world and how they influence your site-responsive research projects? 

My projects have involved sacred encounters from both serendipitous experiences and pre planned fieldwork trips. These are moments of solitude yet connection, awe and tranquility - sometimes a chance interaction with an animal, noticing a symbiosis or living system, an ethereal pattern illuminated by sunlight, emblematic engravings in old structures... These sorts of encounters fascinate me, particularly in relation to the space. I like to consider influences which have made this moment possible, built up over so much time culminating in the ever-present. I am interested in cultivating my own bespoke science to formalise and make sense of these ideas. I take a sort of practice-based research approach, using archival processes to investigate and immerse in the information available. Local museums and libraries are wonderful ways to discover information, slowly and intentionally. The sacrality of the catalytic moment embeds a devotional aspect to my process, however, embracing my own romantic and emotional biases throughout the research. 

I am really interested in your exploration of the dialectical blurring of empirical and non-empirical methods. How do you balance these contrasting approaches in your creative process? 

I find this blurring to be the most exciting yet challenging aspect of my process. While these  contrasting approaches are thought to have such opposing values, for example, science and  art, I believe they are two sides of the same coin of human curiosity and are so deeply embedded within one another. I am inspired by ancient ideas of meandering the crux between opposites, for example, the Buddhist Middle Way, or the Temperance Tarot card,  and how this practice of dialectics and inclusivity can be applied to our modern relationship to nature.  

Although I find that my own sensibilities naturally oscillate from the academic to the creative day to day, reflecting this in the artistic outcome is challenging, especially as I don’t have a background in science or ecology. I often look to artists such as Gala Porras-Kim, Susan  Schuppli and Lucy Sollitt’s The Synthetic Sacred initiative. I also find certain compositions which intersect both the empirical and non-empirical, by which I usually mean the academic and devotional, like eclectic, annotated, and vertical installations. I am really interested in how the use of text, numbers, symbolic imagery and collected material somehow transverses both research exhibits and shrines. 

Your process often involves intimate, site-specific performances captured through photography and video. How do these performances inform and shape the development of your installations? 

Recently, I have become more interested in the nostalgic connotations of photographed and filmed footage, the way it plays with memory and longing, and the spiritual connotation of these feelings. I tend to consider my installations as altar spaces, and if the sculptures are devotional and talismanic artefacts, the video and photos represent the mythologised starting point from which the work sprawls out of. Again, playing with contrasting approaches, in Sacrality Index: Hengistbury Head the video was not the central focus of the installation, but more of a reference, almost like a bibliography to evidence the other works. 

One of the main inspirations for your practice is eco-art and ecofeminism. How do these movements inspire and inform your artistic practice, and what message do you aim to convey through them? 

Ecofeminism inspires me to relate the urgency of the way in which colonial and patriarchal control has degraded our modern relationship to the natural world, and the plethora of social and ecological issues which stem from that. The main message I resonate with is a sense of solidarity and intersectionality - I feel that subversion and interconnection are powerful tools to criticise today’s issues. 

My interpretation of the more recent developments in the eco-art movement, which I would differentiate from land-art, is about a collaborative and healing-based approach, upkeeping a central focus on direct restoration and activism. I deeply appreciate the capacity of science to rehabilitate and protect nature, and artworks which integrate this potential inspire me greatly. For example, Basia Irland’s Gatherings & Repositories are such a wonderful case study for a powerful interrelation between art and science, benefiting from each approach’s capabilities.

Your submitted work, Sacrality Index: Hengistbury Head, is described as an eco feminist pilgrimage. Could you share more about the inspiration and intentions behind this project? 

This project was born from a desire to perform and experience a devotional journey. I was inspired by Hengistbury Head for both its cultural/historical value and its physicality: a monumental geography and complex ecology. I have been familiar with this site for a while during my time living in Dorset, UK, I can even see Hengistbury Head in the distance from the road I live on currently. I felt compelled to devote work to the sacrality of it through long walks to it from different starting points every week, documenting encounters and collecting ephemera. Throughout the process, I intended to paint all these findings in a mythologised light - creating my own rituals, deities and histories. 

It also became an important emotional challenge for me to fully immerse in an English natural environment, as my attitude towards English culture often becomes entangled with identity in a somewhat uncomfortable way, obstructing my natural curiosity. It was a sort of healing pilgrimage for me, discovering wildly interesting features of the site, such as ritual burial mounds containing bronze-age amulets and incense holders, critically endangered natterjack toads, mythical origins to the heathland’s name – once Hedenesburia. 

You have written a dissertation called “The Women in the Waterways: Practice-based  Research and Ecofeminism in the Riparian Artwork of Basia Irland and Betsy  Damon." What can you tell us about this body of work? 

This dissertation explores examples of eco-artists and their methods of creating art with rivers. It became an analysis of how practice-based research processes can embody ecofeminist ideology as a subversive method, while also avoiding essentialist notions. In my research, I became very interested in a critique of ecofeminism, that it can verge on essentialism and black-and-white narratives, which relates to my interest in dialectics and duality. My main aim for the piece was to argue for non-essentialist ecofeminist practices and how these artists beautifully embrace complex, contrasting approaches – blending art with science, politics and social issues.  

Do you believe that engaging in artistic expression is a mode of nurturing? If so, what are the reasons behind this perspective? 

I do believe that engaging in artistic expression is a very powerful tool to nurture. I find that in the arts community I’ve been a part of, many of us share a core motivation of care, despite exploring vastly different concepts, concerns and methods. Whether the nurturing intent of  artistic practice stems from an urge to heal or to grow, I’ve witnessed the artists I’ve been surrounded by tend to their practices as one would tend to a life-form. This sort of process is usually evident in the outcome, a sense of love imbued into the piece which the viewer can sense – manifested care. Many contemporary issues I’ve engaged with in art seem to call for a nurturing reconciliation. I think we can also notice a shift in society’s emotional intelligence, in art and media I often feel that people want to understand eachother more deeply and have a commonplace eco-consciousness.  

What message or call to action would you like to leave our readers with? 

I would really recommend reading Astrida Neimanis’ Hydrofeminism theory for an in-depth read on the intersection of feminism and environmentalism, and Underlands by Sophie J  Williamson for an interesting exploration of geology, post-colonialism and ancestry. 

Read more about the artist here.

Cover image:

Sacrality Index: Hengistbury Head by Annabelle Keyes. Image courtesy of Annabelle Keyes.