Taking part in the part in the residency with GroundWork Gallery, Kings Lynn (Summer 2024) was an exciting and hugely informative experience. During the Research Week the 20 residents were taken on visits, guided by local experts, to a number of sites around north Norfolk to look at the geological, industrial and ecological history of the area. The visits informed our reflections on the theme of the residency - 'Extraction'. Residents were asked to consider

• What is removed from the earth via extraction, excavation, dredging, mining, foraging, etc. and why?
• The effects of extraction on any ecological system.
• The best means to draw attention to extraction

In the second week we began to develop some of the themes explored during the visits, looking through notes and materials gathered, talking with other residents, to start the process of making work in response to what we had seen and learned. There was a wealth of information to call on which I think will continue to inform my practice for some time to come. My starting point was the unimaginably vast timescales in the geological history of some of the places we visited. I think this is why I was so drawn to the Horsetail plants that proliferate in the wetland at Broomhill in Reepham where I stayed. Sometimes described as living fossils, Horsetails are descendants of plants that existed before the dinosaurs. Their delicate radials growing from a central stalk reminded me of the spiral shape fossils we found at the clay quarry. The antecedents of these plants were around when the fossils were living creatures. Fascinated by their structure and longevity, I used a spiral as motif to connect these two organisms across countless millennia. Seeing them alongside Anthropocene detritus, like that found in the soil at the quarries and at Reepham (and almost everywhere else), makes me wonder what will survive from the present into the far distant future.

I am looking forward to attending the GroundUp conference
(November 15th & 16th 2024) when the residents will meet 'to discuss the collaborations and sharing of expertise which informed each project during the artist residencies, looking at what particiapting artists have learned and the implications in terms of their work and its impact'

I hope that GroundWork's residencies and exhibitions, and the GroundWork NetWork continue to grow from strength to strength raising awareness of our place in the ecosystem and what we’re doing (or not doing) to protect it and live sustainably within it.