events
Festival For Imbolc: Maddie Millett
Join us for a wonderful Guided Walk through words and photographs with Maddie Millett on Thursday 25th February 2021.
A few words from Magical Women about Maddie and her work for Imbolc Festival
Maddie is an artist with a keen sense of the seasons and of her local environment and this is clearly evident in her work. Her practice encompasses walking, writing, clay work, sculpture ritual and incantation. She set these things in relation to one another in travelling live installations that invoke powerful feminine energy and enrich our own connection as viewer with the earth.
For Imbolc, we meet some of the ancient goddesses that she embodies in clay and we walk with her and with them as she explores her home patch at this delicate turning of the calendar. She blazes with the intensity of the coming light and through the journey we take together we watch her transform into the iconographic being she is searching for, stepping into that power in her own right, and perhaps encouraging us to do the same.
“Keep your love for nature, for that is the true way to understand art more and more”
VINCENT VAN GOGH
“Rediscovering my creativity
after a long break was like drinking
from a deep well,
and I was thirsty for more.”
I remembered my love of clay,
a passion that is with me still.
After the sometimes torturous process of academia
while completing my sculpture degree
I struggled to find my way back to the bones
of what my art is to me
and to become more real and clear to myself.
My practice now involves a lot of being;
walking in woods
or the peaceful sanctum of the cemetery,
lying in the long grass or exploring forgotten paths
and allowing it all to feed into what I make.
I am seeing the worth of my previous
nascent ideas and realising I was on the right track,
but I didn’t have the right support
or faith in myself back then
I’m fascinated with and curious about ancient clay artefacts,
connection in nature,
myths, stories and rituals
(which often make more sense to me
than the shrill cacophany of the ‘real’ world).
Problems fade into the distance
as I step out into nature
and my refined senses absorb so much,
my attention no longer scattered but honed in
on the tiny movements of birds.
The delicate colours of the sky
move my deeply emotional soul
and the traipsing ivy
becomes an enchanted bower
in my limitless imagination.
I am able to express myself fully and convey my true intentions in my art.
My images and clay forms speak for me
without the spoken words that are so often
misinterpreted or misunderstood.
Our Lady of the Green Heart by Maddie
My art is me, and sets me free.
About Maddie
Maddie Millet is an artist who uses raw, sustainable and found materials in her clay and installation work. Having recently moved house to a home on the edge of the town but surrounded by fields and trees, Maddie engages with the natural world around her by going on walks and sharing her wanderings with us. Through photography weaved in with her own words, her clay goddesses, and other inspirations from poets’ pens and ancient tongues, we discover the fiery light that burns brightly all around and from within her.
Guestbook in response to the Artist’s Work
Here is feedback left by visitors to Maddie’s Guided Walk.
Thank you so much for this beautiful exploration of the creative process, especially the ways in which walking and the natural world both soothe and inspire. I particularly loved Maddie’s use of clay and all the meaning that it holds. Thank you!
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Bee, Folkestone, UK
Beautiful, absolutely loved it. Thank you so much Maddie. Xx
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Lorraine, Dudley, West Midlands, UK
I love Maddie’s guided walk and her beautiful photographs. I’ve been a Facebook friend for a long time.
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Vanessa, Western Australia
Hi Maddie, just what was needed to ponder on and delight in – As a friend of yours, Maddie, I am loving the creativity that you are scooping from your depths. Thanks for your inspiration and sharing the coming of Spring through your reading, clay goddesses, meanderings and photos xx
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Kait, North Wales, UK
Hi Maddie, loved your pictures of marigold, holly, ivy. Your sculptures look tactile. I too love graveyards. Your video is a good explanation of things i am not familiar with like ‘Imbolc’. I am just getting to know about pagan history. Thanks for a good inlet. Xx
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Wendy, London, UK