Intimately Connected- Claire Ward

My connection with landscape and nature began in childhood when I roamed woods and pasture close to my home in Kent. Solitary walks and observing nature have been at the centre of my life ever since and continue here in Northumberland, my home of some 25 years.

It is this connection that drives my practice which generally begins with a found object, natural or manmade, that fascinates me in some way. Working with my hands and using simple tools allow me to closely explore these objects and to go on an imaginative journey to find the form that they reveal.

It becomes increasingly important to me that I use materials that derive from my own domestic waste and that don't always qualify for the recycling bin. To this end I have an increasing collection of old clothing and other fabrics, plastic packaging, paper and cardboard, pill packets and night light holders to name but a few.

In the making of my work I am seeking a blurring of the boundaries between the natural and the man made and how the two might coalesce to create a geology or natural history of our intimately connected presence on this Earth.

Additionally, during the course of the exhibition I shall be making an artwork on the exterior of the building using waste donated to me by people visiting the Alnwick Household Waste Recovery Site.