Hill End is a landscape where masses of looming earth are juxtaposed with the greed and labours of man. The gold rush was a complete mismanagement and destruction of the environment and had disturbing physical realities. There was no appreciation for the sacredness of this land. Miners turned clear streams into cloudy ones and flooded valleys just to serve their needs. Hill End today is a town extinct from its original purpose and declined from the excessive exploits of its inhabitants (Gavin, 1995). This trauma is embodied as you move through the town, a sorrowful quietness -something I wanted to capture in my ceramic forms.

The process of making these pieces and manipulating them is a way to communicate my anxieties over destruction and trauma on the environment that continues today. I also wanted to explore the costs of greed and labour to the human body in this process. The forms have a soft feminine quality, but there is a force trying to push back from the inside.