the ethnographic object - a subject of decolonial making

This work explores the diaspora of objects. My starting point is the ‘traditional’ domestic coiled terracotta pot, burnished, low fired and communally made and by women in West Africa. Pots travelled to colonial museums where they were decontextualised and classified as ethnographic objects to highlight otherness and remain in these settings where they suggest a fixed tradition and creative stasis.

Working within this ceramic lineage, and drawing on craft and historical narratives, my intention has been to challenge the idea of fixed tradition by disrupting and activating form and surface, as a means of storytelling and embodied practice. I worked expressively, and gesturally leaving making marks and the print of the hand to create objects that evoke labour and landscapes, and are bodily in form and expression. Layers of colours insinuate fire, sun, vegetation, night, tropicality, joy, humour and pain, always with the blue of the ocean- absolutely fundamental to diasporic histories.

The work sits alongside wider socio-political narratives and decolonial discourse which I have brought together through making. It can speak to post-colonial hybridity, Gilroy’s double consciousness of the black Atlantic, or the objects can simply exist in their own space on the edge of pot and figure, traditional craft and art, glaze and paint, monument and decoration.

I am a daily list-writer and have been exploring the list as a method of poetic critical writing.

Organic material burns out during kiln firing. I embed corn, coffee, rice, peanuts and sugar - all linked in some way to the diasporic experience, to leave thier trace.

sunwarming his shoulder

h43 d27cm engobe, porcelain slip and glaze

incite inflict inhabit inhibit injure inure inveigle invite invoke involve

what sweet harmony the breeze brings me

H56 d69 cm

engobe, underglaze, glaze

There is always a wonderful element of unpredictability in the transformation of clay to ceramic at high temperature in the kiln. In my imagination, this piece consciously shifted position and posture to find respite from the heat.

failure making manifest unexpected celebrate challenge chaos knowledge power process progress reflect represent risk form think build discuss glow coil

to the waves left behind h28 d41 cm coloured clay, layered white engobe

the moonlight playsgolden butterfly

h50 diam 75cm glaze, underglaze and engobe

yellow white imprint plan diffract read provoke colour write disrupt smile golden green burn mark trace burnish

The smoother surface on this piece makes it read more like a canvas. I layerd and erased colour over a period of a few weeks.

constellations of liquid treasure

h35 d30 cm layered underglazes

orchestra - is the sea

h40 d39 cm

engobe, underglaze and glaze

At a certain point when I have been coil building, I put the form into a bucket or bowl to support it. I continue without being able to see the part that I have built, which allows me to work expressively in the moment without worrying about symmetry or the what the whole piece looks like. At the end, I decide which will be the top or the base.

reference bleed dark day imagine imbricate impart ephemeral theory memory

Where is your son?

What is your home?

h58 d42 cm engobe, underglaze and glaze

weep wait wound weight

h37 d44 cm

brushed engobe bisque fired

red, i just decided...red

The surface on this piece was about ‘embracing ruin’ as a way to unlock my fear and inhibition about painting in the bold and expressive way that I wanted to achieve.

materiality texture mould language lush slump light sea sky ethnography express distort dominant concatenation lighten enlighten labour forms

broken in a langorous dance

h36 d40 cm

engobe, underglaze and glaze

shout landscape ochre contest hierarchy translate water obliterate organise spectatorial subjectivity

terracotta territorial artistic attention metaphor flame

We are in the middle of the sea…

Crazy in space

h50 d59 cm engobe, underglaze and glaze

The sea in return kindles the fires

h27 d30 cm engobes, glaze sandblast areas

black blue body boundary

the waves after him run

h39 d28 cm engobe, underglaze and glaze

erase canonise joyful sorrow ephemeral agency figure fire order sun speak calm narrative system incendiary dialogue dissonance dull earth

imagine try intend

iterate test

The journey started here, with this small pot. Working quickly and intuitively, I mixed coffee beans, black eyed peas and sand with terracotta clay, added pieces of coloured porcelain and then covered the piece with porcelain slip and some glaze here and there.

Making tests is really the only way that I can start any project. It just gets my hands thinking. Test pots are not only generative and informative, but they are also beautiful objects in their own right.

These are all roughly the same size, with a max height of approximately 22cm and max diameter of approximately 15cm.

h27 d20 cm slip, engobe and glaze

testing slips and glazes

Sustainability statement:

The steps to the fired ceramic state, and the longevity of the material provide challenges to minimal carbon consumption and sustainability. Without completely changing the core of my practice, I consciously try to work as sustainably as possible, incorporating the wins and losses into an overall lifestyle effort of sustainable living.

Specifically, within my ceramic practice, I source clay and any materials from as close as possible to decrease the footprint associated with transport. If transport is required, I try to bulk buy to minimise the journeys required, whilst avoiding excess consumption. As much as possible, I use found objects as tools, and keep glaze tests and samples. If the desired outcome can be achieved with a single firing, I do that. Otherwise, I fire to the lowest possible temperature, as few times as possible, in a fully packed kiln. It is incredibly difficult to be sure about the provenance of raw materials, so once I leave the RCA, it will take some resolve and digging to lay this out and make informed choices based on what I find.

A big thank you to the technicians, lecturers and tutors in the RCA Ceramics & Glass department for their invaluable support and teaching every step of the way.

Titles of work in italics are phrases taken from O Navio Negreiro, written by the Brazilian abolitionist poet Castro Alves. Translations are from allpoetry.com and mypoeticside.com