Natural clay has the ability to hold many different forms.

Maybe because of its intrinsic properties, many cultures and peoples have used clay in their remembrance and grief processes: In the Neolithic period, clay pottery was placed in graves to provide food, drink, and tools for the afterlife. In Etruscan civilisations, clay urns stored ashes, with lids often sculpted to resemble the deceased reclining at a banquet. In Japan's Kofun period, clay figures were placed on burial mounds, acting as sentinels to protect the dead and in ancient Greece, votive offerings such as terracotta figurines were left at graves or sanctuaries, possibly acting as tokens to honour the deceased.

As part of the AMOLAD (A Matter Of Life And Death) Festival this year we would like to invite you to decorate your own Clay Remembrance object.

Processes of grief and remembrance don’t have a time period attached to them and so whether you are remembering a loved one who died recently or a long time ago we would like to invite you to decorate a small sculpture to honour someone who has died. You can decorate something that reminds you of that person, this could be a figure that resembles them, an object that reminds you of them or something that represents how you feel about them, such as a heart of a flower.

Once you have decorated your object, you can either hold onto your keepsake or place it outside, in a significant place or a garden, to allow it to slowly return to the earth.

Location: Industrial Gallery