The inspiration for this piece came from viewing fossilised moth cocoons from the cretaceous period at the Natural History Museum. I was mesmerized by the ability for something as ephemeral as a chrysalis or cocoon the size of a 5p coin to survive to the point of discovery and then be categorised. What emerged from these tiny cocoons flew with the dinosaurs and other species lost to history. It’s an interesting concept that whilst we live in the Anthropocene, we too may be preserved in organic matter like the people of Pompei or the Seamus Heaney’s Tolland Man. And just like the heat of the volcanic earth my nests are subject to the same powerful metamorphosis in the gas reduction firing. Where a live flame travels through the kiln permanently changing and yet fixing the clay to ceramic.