Peter Mason visits a touring exhibition featuring a group of contemporary artists who are inspired by materials from the ancient past
A few days before I went to see Re-Making the Past: 6 Makers Respond to Prehistory, the Guardian newspaper carried a report on a new theory about the prehistoric use of Stonehenge.
It suggested that the megaliths would not have been used at ground level, but would have supported a circular wooden platform on which the ceremonies and rituals were performed.
This suggestion is just the latest theory in a long history of speculation and debate. And, as part of her submission for this exhibition – held at the Devon Guild of Craftsmen in Bovey Tracey when I saw it – Syann van Niftrik included a film in which the archaeologist Lorraine Mepham says that when archaeologists use the word “ritual” it often means they don’t know what is going on.
Yet all the six makers in this exhibition share a fascination with the ancient past. The importance of materials is borne out by the way we categorise periods of prehistory: the stone age, bronze age and iron age. And the investigation of the materials used in the making of pottery, metals and textiles is also a key element in archaeology.
It is these processes that the makers in this exhibition have used as the basis of their work. Just as archaeologists use the evidence they find to speculate about the function of the objects they discover and the cultures of the people who made them, so the makers have used their artistic imaginations to create new work relevant to today.
It is particularly appropriate that the bronze age provided the main focus for the makers as Bovey Tracey lies on the edge of Dartmoor, which has some of the most extensive bronze age remains in Europe, if not the world. The makers who, for me, most successfully bring this period alive in a new way are Mary Butcher, Susan Kinley and van Niftrik.
Beautiful forms
The 50 tiny, fragile boats made of willow and bark, decorated with beads and ink, of Mary Butcher’s Boat Hoard and her Boat Mirage, speak of the delicacy and transience of prehistoric life.
Her creations in willow, especially a work called Gathering Dish, are aesthetically beautiful while echoing the prehistoric forms that inspired them.
The pieces made by Kinley are her response to the neolithic landscape of the Orkney Islands. The pattern of her wall pieces, Far Distant, Close To and Island Chain, are made up of random shapes echoing the contours and coastlines, with colours reflecting the textures of the stones and the lichens growing on them.
In contrast, visitors are invited to look from above into the box-like shapes of Home. Visit any collection of hut circles today and it is likely that you will have to ook down into the remains of the prehistoric houses and imagine the lives of the inhabitants. With Home, Kinley invites the modern gallery audience to do the same.
One of the most impressive parts of Re-making the Past is the project developed by van Niftrik. She brought together the potter Jonathan Garratt, the archaeologist Lorraine Mepham and the documentary filmmaker Zan Barberton in a project entitled History in the Breaking. Garratt was commissioned to make a vessel that was engraved on the inside with the thoughts of the maker.
After the pot was made it was smashed and then reconstructed by the archaeologist in the same way she would have done with an ancient piece of pottery. Her thoughts were then written on the outside.
The whole process was filmed – the film becoming an integral part of the whole project – with Garratt and Mepham discussing their thoughts throughout the process.
Van Niftrik’s other piece in the exhibition is completely different. Hanging from the ceiling, Coil, Moments of Eternity is a spiral, gong-like work made of bronze.
A beater has been placed close by it and, while there is no specific invitation to use it, its presence underlines the possibility that Coil could be used for ceremonial purposes.
Having worked with a unique clay, called gabbroic, from the Lizard peninsula in Cornwall for a number of years, Helen Marton obtained bronze-age shards made of this clay and scanned them using digital microscopy and petrography to source data on the geological content of the clay and imagery.
She then used this to create dramatically printed cotton pieces – for example, Sight Over Time, which is reminiscent of a pair of giant oven gloves.
Much of her work, for this viewer at least, required information from the catalogue to help explain the relationship to the prehistoric source material. More accessible was her giant necklace-like piece Cornwall Looms Large, with huge beads made from the gabbroic clay and feldspar chips.
A bronze-age journey
The jewellers Gary Wright and Sheila Teague have used their expertise to create a larger piece of work than their practice would normally require. Odyssey imagines a journey across the bronze-age world from Europe to the Middle East.
In the words of the makers, the journey begins “with only a gold-encased sycamore staff” and then “the traveller creates a memento of each unfamiliar culture visited”.
Each of the pieces “collected” are made of aluminium – a modern, space-age material that was unknown to ancient people – and engraved with motifs drawn from the flora and fauna of the places visited. The time spent understanding Wright & Teague’s major work pays dividends.
So, overall, how successful was this exhibition? In van Niftrik’s film, Garratt says that when contemporary artists try too hard, content is often the first casualty – “in the worst of it there is no content”.
The Victorian designer William Morris thought that makers should bring art into their work and artists should look at the making of their art.
Re-Making the Past succeeds best is where the makers, consciously or unconsciously, have followed the ideas of Morris and avoided the pitfall highlighted by Garratt.
The pieces that were most successful for me were not only great examples of contemporary art and craft, but also brought alive periods of prehistory in a unique way that took the viewer in a different direction from the discipline of archaeology.
Cost £2,000 (mounting the exhibition, administration and marketing)
Funders Arts Council England (£15,000); Devon Guild of Craftsmen
Curators Susan Kinley; Saffron Wynne
Re-Making the Past is at the Craft Studies Centre, Farnham, until 18 July and then Bilston Craft Gallery, near Wolverhampton, from 8 August- 31 October
Peter Mason is a freelance arts writer
A few days before I went to see Re-Making the Past: 6 Makers Respond to Prehistory, the Guardian newspaper carried a report on a new theory about the prehistoric use of Stonehenge.
It suggested that the megaliths would not have been used at ground level, but would have supported a circular wooden platform on which the ceremonies and rituals were performed.
This suggestion is just the latest theory in a long history of speculation and debate. And, as part of her submission for this exhibition – held at the Devon Guild of Craftsmen in Bovey Tracey when I saw it – Syann van Niftrik included a film in which the archaeologist Lorraine Mepham says that when archaeologists use the word “ritual” it often means they don’t know what is going on.
Yet all the six makers in this exhibition share a fascination with the ancient past. The importance of materials is borne out by the way we categorise periods of prehistory: the stone age, bronze age and iron age. And the investigation of the materials used in the making of pottery, metals and textiles is also a key element in archaeology.
It is these processes that the makers in this exhibition have used as the basis of their work. Just as archaeologists use the evidence they find to speculate about the function of the objects they discover and the cultures of the people who made them, so the makers have used their artistic imaginations to create new work relevant to today.
It is particularly appropriate that the bronze age provided the main focus for the makers as Bovey Tracey lies on the edge of Dartmoor, which has some of the most extensive bronze age remains in Europe, if not the world. The makers who, for me, most successfully bring this period alive in a new way are Mary Butcher, Susan Kinley and van Niftrik.
Beautiful forms
The 50 tiny, fragile boats made of willow and bark, decorated with beads and ink, of Mary Butcher’s Boat Hoard and her Boat Mirage, speak of the delicacy and transience of prehistoric life.
Her creations in willow, especially a work called Gathering Dish, are aesthetically beautiful while echoing the prehistoric forms that inspired them.
The pieces made by Kinley are her response to the neolithic landscape of the Orkney Islands. The pattern of her wall pieces, Far Distant, Close To and Island Chain, are made up of random shapes echoing the contours and coastlines, with colours reflecting the textures of the stones and the lichens growing on them.
In contrast, visitors are invited to look from above into the box-like shapes of Home. Visit any collection of hut circles today and it is likely that you will have to ook down into the remains of the prehistoric houses and imagine the lives of the inhabitants. With Home, Kinley invites the modern gallery audience to do the same.
One of the most impressive parts of Re-making the Past is the project developed by van Niftrik. She brought together the potter Jonathan Garratt, the archaeologist Lorraine Mepham and the documentary filmmaker Zan Barberton in a project entitled History in the Breaking. Garratt was commissioned to make a vessel that was engraved on the inside with the thoughts of the maker.
After the pot was made it was smashed and then reconstructed by the archaeologist in the same way she would have done with an ancient piece of pottery. Her thoughts were then written on the outside.
The whole process was filmed – the film becoming an integral part of the whole project – with Garratt and Mepham discussing their thoughts throughout the process.
Van Niftrik’s other piece in the exhibition is completely different. Hanging from the ceiling, Coil, Moments of Eternity is a spiral, gong-like work made of bronze.
A beater has been placed close by it and, while there is no specific invitation to use it, its presence underlines the possibility that Coil could be used for ceremonial purposes.
Having worked with a unique clay, called gabbroic, from the Lizard peninsula in Cornwall for a number of years, Helen Marton obtained bronze-age shards made of this clay and scanned them using digital microscopy and petrography to source data on the geological content of the clay and imagery.
She then used this to create dramatically printed cotton pieces – for example, Sight Over Time, which is reminiscent of a pair of giant oven gloves.
Much of her work, for this viewer at least, required information from the catalogue to help explain the relationship to the prehistoric source material. More accessible was her giant necklace-like piece Cornwall Looms Large, with huge beads made from the gabbroic clay and feldspar chips.
A bronze-age journey
The jewellers Gary Wright and Sheila Teague have used their expertise to create a larger piece of work than their practice would normally require. Odyssey imagines a journey across the bronze-age world from Europe to the Middle East.
In the words of the makers, the journey begins “with only a gold-encased sycamore staff” and then “the traveller creates a memento of each unfamiliar culture visited”.
Each of the pieces “collected” are made of aluminium – a modern, space-age material that was unknown to ancient people – and engraved with motifs drawn from the flora and fauna of the places visited. The time spent understanding Wright & Teague’s major work pays dividends.
So, overall, how successful was this exhibition? In van Niftrik’s film, Garratt says that when contemporary artists try too hard, content is often the first casualty – “in the worst of it there is no content”.
The Victorian designer William Morris thought that makers should bring art into their work and artists should look at the making of their art.
Re-Making the Past succeeds best is where the makers, consciously or unconsciously, have followed the ideas of Morris and avoided the pitfall highlighted by Garratt.
The pieces that were most successful for me were not only great examples of contemporary art and craft, but also brought alive periods of prehistory in a unique way that took the viewer in a different direction from the discipline of archaeology.
Project data
Cost £2,000 (mounting the exhibition, administration and marketing)
Funders Arts Council England (£15,000); Devon Guild of Craftsmen
Curators Susan Kinley; Saffron Wynne
Re-Making the Past is at the Craft Studies Centre, Farnham, until 18 July and then Bilston Craft Gallery, near Wolverhampton, from 8 August- 31 October
Peter Mason is a freelance arts writer