'ROT' 2023
Clay, stains, glazes
ROT is a body of work exploring the way plants and lichen reclaim abandoned human made objects and landscapes. This ceramic pair investigates themes of life and death through the relationship between gravestones and the lichen that grows on them. The vessels are adorned with intricate designs drawing upon common motifs in cemeteries, medical journals and biological illustration, transforming the work into a sort of collage or assemblage of both living and dead. Erupting out of the grey ceramic urns are an amalgamation of different foamy glazes, covering and obscuring the illustrations underneath. Each ceramic urn in this piece went through multiple transformative stages, mirroring the stages of rot and decay. The permanent nature of clay as a material makes this work an immortalisation of a moment in the ephemeral process of decomposition.