Artist-in-residence
Land of Lead and Silver
North Pennines National Landscapes
Between June and September, I worked with the North Pennines National Landscapes team on the Land of Lead and Silver project. This project focusses on the Lead and Silver mining heritage of the North Pennines. After an initial research period I threw myself into the creative development I had been so eager for. The goal for this residency was to reach new audiences and explore new ways of communicating ideas of landscape heritage. One of my personal outcomes was a strong interest in my own northern heritage and what more I can do, to continue to engage others to learn more about out shared heritage and why this landscape we all love so much, is the way it is today!
Beginning this project as a ceramic artist, I was used to spending most of my time covered in clay, throwing pots and illustrating them. This residency offered me the development time to push myself into other areas I was interested, such as hand building, print-making and textiles.
Considering this residency focussed on heritage, creating a quilt seemed like the right thing to do! I am not claiming to be a quilt-maker, but I am very proud of the basic quilt that I made. This quilt became the background for my large mixed-media landscape piece. The process of making the quilt included basting, hand stitching, using a sewing machine, freehand embroidery and sewing in mixed media pieces, such as maps and poetry. I created a 5ft x 3ft backboard and frame for my this piece as well as framing the piece once everything else was completed.
During this residency I focused on developing skills in the hand building discipline of ceramics. The ceramic tile frame I created was completely handbuilt and precisely measured so that each piece would fit together. I really enjoy hand building and look forward to integrating more hand built pieces alongside my thrown work.
What I have learned through my residency?
I have learnt so much about the mining heritage and how this has shaped the landscape that I love. I have learnt about the Geology of the North Pennines and why this is so important for the industrial opportunities that took place here, this has always been something that has interested me but also quite often something I have found difficult to get my head around, learning about it in a completely different way, through a creative practice has given me a new way of understanding the landscape and a deeper way to connect with it. I have learnt more about the women’s roles within this farmer/miner communities and the important role they played, farming the land, raising children and creating necessary items like quilts and rugs to support and maintain family and home. I had time to develop my understanding of some of the rare, lead-tolerant plants such as Mountain Pansies, Spring Sandwort, Pyrenean Scurvygrass, Sea Thrift and Lichens such as Cladonia and Peltigera.
EXHIBITION PIECES:
The main piece named ‘Land of Lead and Silver’ was a mixed media quilt with a ceramic frame and ceramic pieces illustrating a mixture of social history and the landscape of the North Pennines. The focus of the piece was the mosaic of Calaminarian grassland plants, a community of plants that grow in metal-rich soils. These plants were the first thing that I learnt about during my residency, I then learnt more about the social history, the roles that women played, including farming the land and creating quilts and rugs out of the necessity of enduring cold winters. I learnt that my great, great grandmother would create rugs and quilts for the family home in Alston, I honoured this by choosing to create a quilted background of patchwork shades of green to represent the hills within the North Pennines. During the workshops I ran, I encouraged everyone to create a mixture of ceramic flowers and mining infrastructure, inspired by Calaminarian grasslands and images I had printed out about the Social History and Mining infrastructure - these pieces, created by workshop attendees were included in the final mixed media piece.​​
The second piece I made was “A porcelain trilogy”, three porcelain dresses, mounted onto board and calico with use of wire and thread detailing. Often overlooked and underrepresented within mining history, this piece was inspired by the women who were at the heart of these mining communities. Some of their many responsibilities included; farming the land, raising children, cooking, baking, making rugs and producing quilts. This piece became a gesture of appreciation for the unsung names of the women who left their mark on the culture of the North Pennines. The fragility of these thin, clean and white porcelain dresses, contrasts with the rugged beauty of the women that they frame. Young girls, farmers and mothers growing up and living in this industrial landscape, now disappearing into our ever-distancing northern heritage, but their spirits live on in the rugs, quilts and ancestry they left behind.
The final pieces were two vases inspired by the geology:
Vase 1: “Fractures, Faults and Fluorspar”
Using white stoneware with copper glazes and silver lustre. This vase is inspired by the rich mineral veins of the North Pennines, aiming to explore the major influence of our valuable industrial heritage - the geology. Within the layers upon layers of rock, fractures and faults form before being filled by mineral rich fluids, which cooled leaving the deposits of Galena, Fluorspar, Zinc and other valuable minerals. This vase glows green like Fluorspar and shines with Silver to honour the beauty of the natural landscape that we are lucky enough to live within.
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​Vase 2: “Layers of the landscape”
White stoneware with copper glazes and silver lustre. This piece aims to explore the layers of the North Pennines Landscape in an abstract and textural way. Inspired by the tactile experience of running your hand across the rocks, this vase brings together textures and tones of our rugged environment. Varying between textures and terrain, the topography of the lines depict the hilly landscape of the North Pennines.
Workshops!
My goal was to reach a younger audience and each workshop had a mixture of ages. The first two workshops were focussed on the Calaminarian grasslands, social history and mining infrastructure, each person made a selection of pieces inspired by these topics, and engaged with the mining heritage throughout the workshops by using images, to inspire discussion amongst the group about the social history, infrastructure and habitats. These pieces were then used to influence one of my final exhibition pieces. The third workshop was a linoprinting workshop, creating lino-cuts inspired by the mining heritage, there was a mixture of prints created such as: mine carts, mine entrances, abstract crystals, lead-tolerant plants, and the upland wading birds commonly seen and associated with the North Pennines. The final workshop was creating ceramic tiles inspired by the landscape, this was in Nenthead, a village built by the London Lead Company. These pieces showed a mixture of mining infrastructure, local mining sites and personal connections to the mining heritage.
Workshop feedback
The feedback from both the workshops and the exhibition has been amazing. A number of people who attended my linoprinting workshops have now bought linocutting equipment to continue this skill at home, taking similar inspirations from the landscape and history of the North Pennines. A number of people who came to my pottery workshops have reached out and now attend our 10-week pottery course. One lady who attended my workshop came due to her interest in the heritage but was struggling with pain when she first arrived, by the end of the workshop, she had relaxed into the peaceful side of pottery and was in near to no pain by the end of the session.
My research throughout my residency has also been a point of discussion amongst the large creative community I am part of in Teesdale. Being able to express my interest, discovered throughout the residency, has inspired conversations and discussion with various groups of people based upon the mining heritage I have explored. A number of people I have spoken with have gone away and found out more about their personal northern heritage and returned to tell me about their great grandmothers rugs and quilts and about their families being part of small mining communities.
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A little thank you to the North Pennines National Landscapes...
The North Pennines National Landscapes team offered me support at every stage of my residency. Providing me with books, resources, introducing me to local experts and leading educational days in Killhope, Nenthead and Weardale Museum. As well as offering their knowledge on the lead mining history they also helped to prepare and during the workshops. The team has helped me gain confidence to dive deeper into subjects that have previously challenged me and have given me confidence in my own artistic abilities. Thank you so so much Rebecca, Andie & Sarah.
Whats next?
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Going forwards as an artist, my main inspirations are changing, once taking inspiration mainly from the landscape and wildlife of the North Pennines, my perspective has taken a shift to focussing on the landscape heritage of the area and my personal northern heritage, this has been heavily inspired by this residency. I am also hoping to continue to learning more about quilt making to follow in my great great grandmothers footsteps and have begun to focus on new pottery techniques that will help me to communicate ideas surrounding heritage and the importance in understanding, reconnecting and preserving the heritage of the North Pennines.
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I hope to pursue engaging more young people in the local heritage. I think it is so important, especially in such a rural area to have meaningful connections with the local community and the landscape that they live in, this keeps the spirit of a place alive whilst the cultural norm can quite often be to leave the countryside to find community within a city. My aim is to create a community of young adults in Teesdale that can develop their knowledge and passion for the area in a fun, creative and sustainable way.