A Reminder That We are Nature
Monday - Stories from the Studio
I like to think that I am part of a long and ancient linage that stretched back to the folks whose hands carved ancient figurines such as the Woman of Willendorf 30,000 years ago, and the Woman of Holle Fells who predates her by another 10,000 years. I can’t help but imagine the hands who created them, the lives they lived and the landscapes they lived in. Knowing their individual, or perhaps communal intention behind their creations would of course be an amazing insight.
I wonder if we share the same space of liminality. A place you enter when making dolls, a place where time stands still and the the idea of the doll is right there in front of you, as if it already exists. Each and every detail is there.
I’ve made hundreds of dolls over the years from great dark towering antlered creations, to dolls without human faces wearing shells, or birch tree eyes. Dolls are born from that liminal place. I think that’s part of the fascination, for they hold their own magic and have a foot in both worlds.
Twig Poppets
Someone asked me the intention for my twig poppet dolls. Their final intention is one I leave for those whose hands they end up in, but my intention in making them is one of weaving the land together.
Their form is made from twigs, gathered in special places. Those twigs (often birch) grew as tree, roots intermingled in the ground, engaging in their unique symbiotic relationship with funghi, and their communication with all their kin around them. Both silver and downy birch are the most common native trees in Scotland.
This poppet doll is formed around birch twigs, which hold the memory of the tree, and the place in which it grew. Her white shawl is inspired by the white of the birch bark, while her hair wears some usnea, which is a nod to it’s very presence, as a god indicator of favourable air quality.
My current series of Twig poppets are dressed in Harris Tweed - made on the Isle of Harris in the Outer Hebrides. Tweed is made from the colours of the land and this poppet wears a tweed with the deep cerise of bell heather which is currently in flower (I took this photo yesterday while out walking).
This poppet wears a Harris tweed the colour of the water around the beaches of the Isle of Harris - yes, they really are that colour.
But back to the question of what are poppet dolls for -
The story of the inspiration of their creation. Although they might have a human form, they are a holder of stories of the trees, of the rain that fell on the trees - the wind that swam through their branches. They are a story of our place in nature, we are as much nature as everything the doll is made from, the difference is that we forget. The trees don’t forget they are nature, hills and the mountains don’t pretend that they are not nature, neither does the sea. Setting ourself apart from nature is a trait only humans have- and so one intentions of these little dolls is a reminder that we too are nature.
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