Process

• I am drawn to the use of mainly clay as a medium, because clay is a tactile medium which is also fluid and allows shifting to take place, as one works with it. It does in a way echoes the notion of evolving emotions of grief which tend to take place with time. I also feel that clay will afford me the opportunity to the coping mechanism as it has that soothing and slippery feel to it. To use clay as a medium for my work is a metaphor which will echo the bible

A collage of images showing some of my processes.

Recording the Performance

• I intend to document my art processes “as a kind of archive of grieving” by recording it, from day to day as I work with clay while moulding the masks sculptures. This will include the recordings of zooming into the meditations of my hands while in different actions of rolling, moulding and putting the clay into forms of masks shapes. For a dramatic effect of my video, I will also try the multi-layer the effects of juxtaposing the moving different light sources and that of my moving hands as I mould the clay while making the masks. • For my sculptural piece I therefore intend weaving some of my mother’s clothes and mine onto the main sculpture, with some of the clothes being made into a fabric rope which will be attached/tied to the dress sculpture and pulling from it will be a contemporary object representing myself) depicting a sense of connection between my mother and myself, and at the same time creating a tension of myself holding on to her memory not wanting to let go of her. • I’ve chosen to use textiles as my medium for my sculptural piece because clothes have an individual’s history, meaning and presence of the body in them, since they have a tendency to retain the memory of the body that was in them by retaining certain shapes of the human. I therefore find clothes as having a personal connection with the deceased, which is what ties me to my deceased mother. My inspiration in the use of textiles as a medium and the weaving technique for my art work also comes from the fact that my mother of whom my artwork is a commemoration of, worked in the textile industry as a seamstress. It was also during her spare time that she wove mats and sew patch work blankets using left over pieces of fabric she bought from the factory as a way to sustain her family. The use of the deceased clothes in my work, is to help bring back good memories of my mother and to mimic her activities, such as weaving that she did when alive.

Textiles