the temple

 

 

this city is an old god who smells of stale urine, clutch fluid, and seared meat,
and prefers offerings of dragon soop and vapes.

this city is an old god who casts rainbows into spilled engine oil,
and holds onto puddles for kids.

this city is an old god who remembers hunger,
likes to gnaw on bones grown thin with indifference,
and suck drops of rancid fat from the corrupt.

 

 

Across sculpture, sound, movement, and writing, ‘the temple’ explores a contemporary queer animist practice to invoke more sustainable ways to be. Born from my ancestral traditions in Ireland, England, and Myanmar, informed by crip perspectives, and made in deference to the city, this project seeks a route through apocalypse. This pursuit is not about the soul-less gleam of technology-yoked futures, or misty-eyed romanticisation of dead pasts, but a hybrid approach, a chimeric spirituality fatberg of where we are now.

These works look to muddled edges, radical kinship, and unruly joy as guides for living and teachers for revolution. They use repurposed, discarded materials alongside new to tell stories that invite relationship with other. They ask whether offering blessings to seal bones, finding medicine in weeds, dancing for magpies, might change how we are on this earth, and with each other.

Apocalypse is not the end, and there are many who know the paths of survival. Together we could compost the smoking ashes of this time, and grow other futures from its grave.

a soft spotlight in a dark space illuminates a hanging sculpture, casting a branching shadow onto the wall and over a large ceramic head with outstretched arms that sits on a wooden plinth.
the temple

Installation view

a dark space lit by a soft spotlight with a speaker and tv on the floor next to a wooden plinth on which a burned-wood bird sculpture with outstretched wings rests. In the middle of the space is a suspended sculpture with rope hanging from the centre
the temple

Installation view

a person wearing black shorts and white latex top lies on the floor of an abandoned concrete building covered in graffiti
mag-pocalypse

A dance to call on magpie's rebellious, mischevious energy with accompanying sound work, one for sorrow. This piece is displayed as the film, devout heathen.

large ceramic head form glazed riotously with purple, grey, green, and blue colours, there are multiple carved eyes, and an open mouth with teeth, through which you can see the inside is gilded gold.
(for blessings)

A gilded, eight-eyed ceramic seal-chimera who holds a prayer bell, and sits in water, inviting blessing. Milk teeth, seal bones, and my children's umbilical cord stumps are carried within.

a ceramic forked tongue glazed metallic blue and purple ripples out from a carved mouth with triangular teeth along the sides, the tongue reaches out over the rim of a metal bowl
(for blessings)

Tongue.

a tongue emerges from the centre of the interior gold-gilded space of a rounded form with circular and triangular shapes in the walls, water covers the bottom.
(for blessings)

Gilded interior.

hands made of red clay tangled in red rope and suspended from a wooden structure hanging in the air, some of the hands hold blobs of green ointment
I give you my body

Ceramic hands tangled in red rope hold lanolin-ghee ointment made using flowering weeds growing uncultivated in the southside.

a red clay hand rests on the floor with the palm upturned. It is holding a white cotton parcel stitched with red thread.
i give you my body

Shroud.

two red clay hands suspended in the air by red rope and thread twined around the fingers, one thread has a small brass bell, one hand holds a large blob of green ointment. In the background, out of focus, a large blue/grey/purple/red conical ceramic head with outstretched arms sits in a metal dish on a wooden plinth and holds a triangular gong. Further back a pale horse puppet sits on a grey cushion on top of a tall wooden plinth.
i give you my body

Hands holding lanolin-ghee ointment.

a white-painted wooden horse puppet with gold detailing sits on a grey cotton and gold silk cushion with red stitching, there are neon green, neon yellow, and bright blue pom poms
the keepers: horse

A yoke thé horse puppet from Myanmar, symbolising the creation of the world. He sits on a cushion stuffed with hair and dried hypericum and calendula (healers). The cushion is made from my grandmother's heirloom fabric, and the t-shirt I wore to give birth to my son.

a grey cushion with purple pom pom on one corner, and neon yellow pom pom on another corner, a plait of hair finishing with a blue pom pom and bell overhangs the wooden plinth on which the cushion sits
the keepers: horse

Cushion with plait.

a black burnt piece of wood with white ashy patches stands supported by a small piece of orange brick, around the charcoal lump is two wraps of red thread with two brass bells of different sizes hanging at the front
the keepers: phoenix

A phoenix carved from felled ash, fallen birch, and reclaimed timber, burned to charcoal and assembled with pom poms, bells, yarns, and placed on a gilded high-fired ceramic plate.