ALICE
CLOUGH

Alice Clough

Photography by Selby McCreery

Unfired porcelain, hair, giclée prints

Exploration of fragility, tenderness and self-care. On Beltane – traditionally a time of growth, fertility and new beginnings – an act of hair-cutting took place. A rite of passage. In cultures around the world hair cutting is a symbolic act, only done to mark a birth, a death, or a major life transition. Hair is understood to contain consciousness, spirit. To cut this is to cut and remove an important and sensing part of being.

How aware are we of the ways we treat our bodies?

How does this affect our wellbeing, and in doing so, the wellbeing of others?

This bowl is built and burnished by hand. I have embedded my hair in unfired porcelain, which remains soft and vulnerable. The burnished surface is easily marked and bruised. Both body and bowl form a gesture of holding, containing, and offering.