As our residency came to a close. We decided to build a sculpture park to outlive us, with each artwork drawing inspiration and reminiscences of experiences and wonders of Stokkøya. The sculptures each tell a narrative, which the audience is now part of, concealed atop a hidden cove and inviting people to convene around a fire of safe haven and storytelling.
The English idiom ‘From the Ground Up’ is to start from the beginning and rebuild, perhaps an accurate representation of what it’s like to be a creative, failing, learning from the mistakes and then going again.
Hopefully, this sculpture lasts the test of time, outliving us and to be discovered by generations of Stokkøya, people on solo journeys, or used as a site to reconnect with old friends or to meet new ones.
As here we are present, constantly re-discovering, starting again and again, From the Ground Up.
From the Ground Up (2023)
Concrete, cob (clay, sand, straw), tubing, breeze block, wire and metal fixings.
Trio group residency.
In September (2023), I took part in an art residency in Stokkøya, Norway.
Alongside the artists Lottie Stephens and Hugo Brazão.
The month long residency took place on a remote island north of Trondheim, called Stokkøya.
Here we found ourselves taken back by the surprise and beauty of nature, and further welcomed by such warming and caring people of the island. We also quickly experienced the unpredictability and vast weather extremes, which you had to yield down to, while we could rely on our neighbours for assistance – we couldn’t expect nature to cater our needs or desires.
It was within this duality, from nature to the weather, that this interplay between paradise and the unpleasant brutality; At this realisation, our work during the residency took shape.