Black Maul Willow contains in its name a plant, a dog/lion and a denotation of my people. As a black woman with a big mouth, it's interesting to sit quietly, shut up and work willow. It is interesting to work in the company of other black women in a Willow Women collective, and this work was achieved in both these ways.
The willow was plaited on Creekside a brownfield site. Nick Bertrand took the time to show me how brownfield sites can contain many species. These species are more vigorous and powerfully related to each other than in tended green parks. It is an interesting use of language.
Making artwork on the brownfield site as a brown woman led me to think about how the brownfield site like black and brown geographies are ripe for "development" and essentially worthless as is although they are actually one of the most fecund and rich environmental spaces.
Brown can be greener than green.
Without a pedestal, this work is horizontal. It hovers brown just below the green tree canopy and follows the trees, not the path. The work is sizable, about 12 metres in length, but somehow also almost invisible in the trees.
The willow is often loose and movable in the structure, and the structure is built so that it cannot hold anything.
This is to release the willow and other sticks like it from the work of containing and sheltering that it has had in contact with humans over the centuries. This work could be fashioned from other local sticks across the African diaspora.
In an African context, the willow looks like the thatch that African women deck houses with or make booms out of. There is such a stick broom in the Garden.
We plaited willow collectively for three days at the Creekside Discovery centre, and we all had many insights about the work and willow. These are published in a short exhibition pamphlet.
The traditional work of willow is to fashion a continuum whereby it is not clear where the willow strand ends and a new one begins. In this work, I wanted to respect the growth length of a willow stick and see it as a single life.
The length of the willow stem relates to the length of its life in the sense that this willow was cut at this point.
The exciting thing is that the central willow lives on and sprouts again vigorously. The willow stem itself also has the potential if replanted, to regenerate and grow again.
This, for me, puts the willow uniquely close to life and death.
I fashioned multiple willow wombs out of plaited willow and spaced them a willow length apart.
These enable us to think about a generation. Between one generation and the next, the willow runs so the work becomes a place where we can step from womb to womb, forward or backward to think about ancestors and futures.
Griot Chineyre said, "The problem with these slavery stories is that they end in the wrong place before the people who are enslaved can claim their freedom."
This work enables us to step into spaces where the story has changed for the better. We can see the way generations verve and steer through a space-time continuum. At some points in the sculpture, we can stand and parallel our womb to the sculptural womb.
The sculpture is situated on a council estate in Deptford in a Garden dedicated to Winnie Mandela the only space owned by and dedicated to a black woman in Deptford. Considering the contribution that the black community has made to London and Deptford, it is hoped that the work can help secure the site, which is both formally and informally dedicated to storytelling and counselling for members of the black community.
We would like to acknowledge the generous commission by Sheffield Hallam University through Empathy & Risk CIC in collaboration with MOSAF (Museum of Slavery and Freedom)to make this work and the support of the Creekside Discovery Centre in sharing space to create and dialogue the work.
Members of the inaugural Willow Women included El Djeli Chinyere Nwobani, Judy Diawara, Matiga Harrower, Reba Martin, Simone Foster
Joining the willow women from Creekside were, Patty Gambini, and Nick Bertrand.