Navigating the arteries of loss: A figurative ceramic exploration of the human condition in situations of loss

Abstract

Navigating the Arteries of Loss is a vision of small haemorrhages of the self which chart emotional progress through life. The research has concentrated on the ways in which loss is expressed through body language – the corporeality of the human condition. The chosen material is clay, built into sculptural forms using coil and slab work. The task has been to find ways in which internal loss might be manifest as a physical expression of the body. The early part of the project has been to investigate loss of life, loss of reason and loss of control which have led to the subject of dualities implicit in the subject of loss: absence and presence, internal and external, secrecy and revelation, darkness and light. The Hare has been used as an Everyman during this series of work. The subject of loss requires a clearly defined palette to achieve a strong visual tension, so the palette has been limited to black and white. Black and white imagine the dualities of absence and presence, light and dark, life and death. The making process has led to an installation that includes found objects; six dining chairs and an iron bed provide a theatrical locale for an installation. The palette, the form and the theme interweave. Process and thinking conjoin, giving a focus and constraint within which to create the tension and anxiety around a situation of loss.