Artist statement
I am a native Appalachian; the fourth generation of my family to follow a migration pattern known as Shuttle Migration. Alternating generations of my family have left their Appalachian roots to follow more technologically advanced jobs and careers - I left in 1994; my grandfather in 1951.
I find the name Shuttle Migration fitting as these patterns established between Appalachia and the Piedmont region of North Carolina were strongly influenced by the textile mills that first moved into the region in the late nineteenth century. Families like mine who follow these migration patterns shuttle back and forth between these two regions all of their lives as if the highways and roads are strings or threads pulling them back to their identity, history, and shared memory. This generational and geographical shuttling forms linear patterns that organize their lives not unlike the linear geological patterns that form the native clays that I dig for my work.
In this installation I explore Place through material, through line, and through memory. Much of this work was created through repetitive processes that allowed me to observe the effects of this pattern of shuttling in my own life. I am exploring how we shape and are shaped by a Sense of Place; how Placemaking is both a generational and geographically collaborative work.
Dry Creek
displaced suburban creek material, suburban clay
In Appalachia we live on creeks not roads. My mom was born and raised on Dry Creek. I was born and raised on Beech Creek the same as my grandfather. When I first moved to Charlotte the absence of the sound of running water, especially at night, was an emotional loss. The creeks here are foreign – warm and slow moving with jagged and roughly broken rocks. The small unnamed creek that runs through my suburban neighborhood is a tributary of Mallard Creek. It is mostly dry and filled with construction debris. Small silent rivulets connect pools of murky brackish water.
During the pandemic when I first became interested in working with clay again, my sons told me about the clay that they discovered in this creek. I have been digging and working with this beautiful cone 6 clay since March of 2020. It is a rich chocolate brown and at cone 10 it is a rich metallic glaze. In this work I have transformed the clay from this unfamiliar creek, molding it into the shape of the familiar stones of my Appalachian home. It has been a healing act of Placemaking.
transportation
color laser copies, typewriter, graphite, wheat paste
The kids are asleep in the back tired from a long weekend. Music plays quietly through a comfortable lull in the conversation and I begin to doze. This stretch of the highway always feels the longest, how many times have I traveled this way? Names of small towns and the smell of cars float through my mind. I try to capture them all - forty-five years of experiences traveling back and forth.
Enter my story, awaken your own images and experiences, and travel home with me
Collection
displaced suburban creek material, sand, ceramic, cedar stump, creek audio, vinyl
You are standing by an Appalachian creek; the air is cool, the water never stops, always rushing onward. You step in – catch your breath at the cold. Your feet numb and you can move again. The grit is fine and clean, the rocks moss covered, the stones smooth on your feet. The water is clear, displaying thousands of small stones or pebbles. You reach down to collect that one that catches your eye.
Those of us who leave Appalachia collect small creek rocks when we visit to carry in our pockets, sit in a jar of water on the kitchen window sill, or line up on our desks – small tokens that keep us connected.
Collect your own pebble to carry with you on your journey.
Feat of Clay
plywood, wax, muslin, suburban clay, Appalachian red clay
These are the artifacts of 'Feat of Clay' performed on November 19th, 2021 during which I walked back and forth on this unfinished quilt top 270 times trailing Appalachian and suburban clays with my feet.
Lineage
Appalachian white clay, stoneware, cotton string, white slip
"When we left we didn't know we were leaving."
My grandfather was one of six sons born on the same small Appalachian farm where I was raised. After WWII all six brothers found jobs in the booming textile industry of North Carolina. All but one eventually settled here in the Piedmont to raise their families. My dad was born in McAdenville and left the day after his high school graduation to be the caretaker of our Appalachian Farm. I was born in Appalachia in 1976 and left to gain an education. I now live here in the piedmont with my own six sons.
Wayfarer
felled suburban walnut, steel
A place to sit by the creek, a place of rest for the weary traveler; referencing overlooks and rest stops.
This dead black walnut was felled near our suburban creek in 2021 for safety concerns. We kept the lengths of the trunk long in order to mill planks for projects
millhands
Appalachian red clay, Joe Pye Weed bast, cotton string, abaca
In 2001 UNCC professors Tyrel Moore and Gerald Ingalls conducted an inventory of textile mills in the Charlotte region. Using archived insurance maps they identified 118 mills in this seven county region; more than a quarter were located in Gaston, Mecklenburg and Cabarrus counties. These mills were established during the 1880s to the 1920s and were a part of a rapid Southern industrial expansion. Mills advertised in Appalachia for workers and news of jobs and opportunity spread by way of mouth.
Moore and Ingalls write that the textile mill economy imprinted in the region in such a way that it is still "a direct threat to the continued existence of open, rural farmland"; the mills " acted as building blocks that gave much needed momentum to an urban forming process that heretofore had proceeded only deliberately." This lure of opportunity continues to drain capital and culture from the Appalachian region, encroach on the rural Piedmont, and feed the rural-urban divide.
accumulation
cherry, steel, ceramic
As you end your journey place your pebble to leave a mark of your passing.
Cairn building in our contemporary culture has become so popular that many of our state and national parks have been forced to issue statements asking visitors not to move the stones in and around our waterways. What is this lure of leaving a mark? A spiritual or emotional act? A desire to connect or communicate? An act of Placemaking for the Misplaced?