‘This is my bark, that layer that forms in response to a balance of forces from an interior world and the exterior one. It is not formed through the intention to access these worlds but rather a continual expression of the changes within them. An imprint, in porcelain – two sides of a surface at a given time.’

Bark is a polyptych: a collection of 24 movements collated to form one.  A work that can be seen as a whole or in parts.  A movement is an arrangement of 36 extrusions, each individually allocated and marked with a code, corresponding to its unique grid reference.  The process begins by taking a ball of impressionable porcelain and pushing it through a handmade mould.  The two-dimensional mould influences the three-dimensional output.  Hand cut shapes of layered card: a square, a circle, a star and a triangle. Each mould provides access to an ephemeral splitting of the shape, to take place before the output is formed, inviting gestures towards the opening up of each individual piece.  Degradation of the tool, the friction of the card and the possibility to engage with and alter the 2D directly before shaping, leads to chance and ever-changing outputs.  Each result is cradled as it moves through the mould, assisted as it moves from vertical to rest and dry horizontally.  Weight, gravity and friction determine its course.  Piercing the back of each porcelain extrusion is the only active force imposed on the still wet formed object. As the porcelain dries before it is fired it becomes fragile, brittle.  The handling here welcomes the possibility to let go of parts, with the piercing determining what is held onto.  When fired to 1235 the work is transformed to a permanent state.  Each work is time stamped with the minute in the day that it was extruded.  

The work’s composition is not a reflection of what is seen but what has happened, and each piece is ordered by time not day.  It means the last extrusion can be located anywhere between 1 and 864.  The piercing made during the making process is then used as a holding for a nail, allowing locations on a wall to become a network of vectors for the composition to reveal itself and be read as a whole.  The work is unglazed to allow for every interaction, and any difficulties encountered during the creation, to remain  exposed, overcome by expression and visibility.  It is a direct engagement with the material.  

The process is the work. The individual movements that move the whole.