Helen Felcey
←
→

Touching Ground

-

Camden Art Centre, London

Priska Falin & Helen Felcey

(2022)

This two-day course held at Cam­den Art Cen­tre is part of an on­go­ing col­lab­o­ra­tion be­tween Pris­ka Falin and my­self as art­ist-re­search­ers; ex­plor­ing a shared in­ter­est in clay, the sub­tle senses, and the body. Touch­ing Ground ex­plored clay work which em­pha­sises ‘being with’ ma­te­ri­al and bring­ing at­ten­tion to the body. We tried new pro­cess­es and tech­niques using clay, in­clud­ing a guid­ed med­i­ta­tion, outlined below.

We en­cour­aged a slow and steady ap­proach to the work­shop, giv­ing time for dif­fer­ent ex­pe­ri­ences to arise, and for peo­ple to find per­son­al ap­proach­es, which could be ex­plored be­yond the work­shop. We also made space for con­ver­sa­tions and re­flec­tion through­out the week­end, en­cour­ag­ing par­tic­i­pants to share ex­pe­ri­ences.

We hope the pro­cess­es and tech­niques we work­ed on of­fer­ed in­sight into the well-being prop­er­ties of clay, how to ben­e­fit from these per­son­al­ly, and how to ex­plore these with others.

Helen Felcey

Nº 1

Helen Felcey

Nº 2

Helen Felcey

Nº 3

Guided meditation — working with a clay pebble and the body

We began by plac­ing the peb­ble on our chest / heart cen­tre. Bring­ing our at­ten­tion to rest light­ly on the breath, we spent time no­tic­ing the gen­tle move­ment of the peb­ble along with the breath. From here, we grad­u­al­ly ex­plored the feel­ing of the peb­ble ‘with­in’ the body, slow­ly mov­ing the clay peb­ble to our neck, arms, and hands. We no­ticed weight, tem­per­a­ture, and bal­ance; what is the light­est touch or feel­ing that can hold the peb­ble? We felt that even the small­est changes in place­ment can en­able a dif­fer­ent ex­pe­ri­ence with­in the body, and we en­joyed no­tic­ing the sub­tlest sen­sa­tions.

Helen Felcey

Nº 4

Helen Felcey

Nº 5

Helen Felcey

Nº 6

Helen Felcey

Nº 7

↑

Touching Ground

-

Camden Art Centre, London

Priska Falin & Helen Felcey

(2022)

This two-day course held at Cam­den Art Cen­tre is part of an on­go­ing col­lab­o­ra­tion be­tween Pris­ka Falin and my­self as art­ist-re­search­ers; ex­plor­ing a shared in­ter­est in clay, the sub­tle senses, and the body. Touch­ing Ground ex­plored clay work which em­pha­sises ‘being with’ ma­te­ri­al and bring­ing at­ten­tion to the body. We tried new pro­cess­es and tech­niques using clay, in­clud­ing a guid­ed med­i­ta­tion, outlined below.

We en­cour­aged a slow and steady ap­proach to the work­shop, giv­ing time for dif­fer­ent ex­pe­ri­ences to arise, and for peo­ple to find per­son­al ap­proach­es, which could be ex­plored be­yond the work­shop. We also made space for con­ver­sa­tions and re­flec­tion through­out the week­end, en­cour­ag­ing par­tic­i­pants to share ex­pe­ri­ences.

We hope the pro­cess­es and tech­niques we work­ed on of­fer­ed in­sight into the well-being prop­er­ties of clay, how to ben­e­fit from these per­son­al­ly, and how to ex­plore these with others.

Helen Felcey

Nº 1

Helen Felcey

Nº 2

Helen Felcey

Nº 3

Guided meditation — working with a clay pebble and the body

We began by plac­ing the peb­ble on our chest / heart cen­tre. Bring­ing our at­ten­tion to rest light­ly on the breath, we spent time no­tic­ing the gen­tle move­ment of the peb­ble along with the breath. From here, we grad­u­al­ly ex­plored the feel­ing of the peb­ble ‘with­in’ the body, slow­ly mov­ing the clay peb­ble to our neck, arms, and hands. We no­ticed weight, tem­per­a­ture, and bal­ance; what is the light­est touch or feel­ing that can hold the peb­ble? We felt that even the small­est changes in place­ment can en­able a dif­fer­ent ex­pe­ri­ence with­in the body, and we en­joyed no­tic­ing the sub­tlest sen­sa­tions.

Helen Felcey

Nº 4

Helen Felcey

Nº 5

Helen Felcey

Nº 6

Helen Felcey

Nº 7

↑

←

→