Kate Haywood – Hoard

4 August – 10 December 2017

Coin weights shining under a rock in a river. Once nestled inside a woven glove. Placed in speed, the textile rots, is washed away. The metal remains. Held by gravity and the memory of a net. Waiting to be found. Given new contexts, new values, new stories, new meanings. What do we lose and what do we find over time as contexts shift and owners change.

‘Hoard’ actively explores our relationship with objects and how we read them as they knit together with our own personal experiences and narratives. These lost contexts and ambiguous groupings offer the potential for poetic forms to emerge.

Kate will revisit the space throughout the exhibition period to re-group and re-assemble the forms, blending further elements and materials to offer a series of possible final readings. Visitors are invited to create their own versions of these artefacts in the gallery space to add to an ever growing public hoard of offerings.

Initial research conducted at the Yorkshire Museum and the National Museum of Denmark inspired the development of this project. This period of study was funded by the Future Lights International Ceramics Competition (Ceramics and its Dimensions/Staffordshire University Bursary) and The Worshipful Livery Company of Wales.