02/03/2025
This lunar new year I wanted to share an ecological somatic clay enquiry from my time at artist residency in dec.
This was a land listening , ancestral research piece exploring the kokdu ( wooden death companions carved onto funeral biers during the Joseon Dynasty in Korean cultural practice ).
The kokdu are guides, companions and beings who support the dead on their journey to the next life. They exist in the boundary between this world and the world beyond , and whilst some representations are in human form they are neither human nor not human.
Some of the traditional roles they offer include : the guide, the guard, the entertainer, the carer as well as mythical creatures such as the dragon and the phoenix .
My process included digging raw clay from the earth, listening , observing , mapping the ecological landscape of the land of for a week , , noticing who grew where and with whom.
Meditating with the plants to connect to their energies , observing how the clay is made up of the decomposed plant material of the land , remembering in death we return to earth, so how could clay kokdu made of the earth guide us in our earthly return, remembering we will decompose and then guide others .
I wanted to explore what emerges from the clay itself, the shapes and textures , what companion creature will they become ?
How does the clay kokdu represent an earthly embodiment of the locality and stories of the land ?
How does this land want to support us ?
