By Sea, By Land
This series is inspired by medieval reliquaries, venerated objects imbued with the power to guide and protect. My works are a reinterpretation of the historic materials and talismanic function of reliquaries, applied to contemporary objects associated with global migration and the perilous journeys made by people compelled to leave their homeland. By Sea, By Land connects the human imperative to migrate to that of the animal kingdom and to free movement around the globe by sea, by land, by air.
The raised words at the center of By Sea I are from the opening line of W.B. Yeats’ poem The Lake Isle of Innisfree (1890), bringing together nostalgia and longing for an imagined sanctuary in nature with the harsh realities of the asylum seeker.