Tag: workshop

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Moss Collective Open Studio: Rock Paper Stitch. IMMA Earth Rising 2024.

On the left, a paint brush made with sheep's wool and three pens, all made with bamboo. They rest on a white paper drawn with fluid brown marks, the ink is pomegranate ink. A cluster of dried rushes project shades on the paper, while the top right corner of the paper is darkened by a shadow.

Rock Paper Stitch is a series of workshops we designed and facilitated for IMMA (Irish Museum of Modern Arts) during Earth Rising Festival 2024. Drawing Tool Making, Collective Pomegranate Ink Drawing, Stitch As Mark-Making and Dandelion Twine were entry points for the conversations and series of actions we are interested in generating.

Moss Collective is formed by Ciara Brehony, Joanna Kidney, Elida Maiques and Susan Montgomery. Things we are about: thinking with our hands, restoring bonds between crafts, science and arts, making friends with plants, being slow as a form of resistance, livable futures for all.

For one week early in 2024 we became a household of women with no children, no wives, no husbands, no parents. The kitchen table went from porridge to sharp tools, making paint brushes and cane pens, testing pomegranate ink, crushing rocks with mortar and pestle, drawing with thread and needle. Our workshops and ethos stem from that residency.

Brush making detail
Brush Making workshop with Elida Maiques
Dandelion Twine workshop with Joanna Kidney
Brush Making workshop with Elida Maiques
A scroll of white paper with abstract marks in grey and black inks, which we made with pomegranate. This is the aftermath of a collective drawing workshop where we test the drawing tools we just made.
Pomegranate ink collective drawing
Stitch As Mark-Making workshop with Ciara Brehony
Compost after your workshop with the worms

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The Sally Garden (IMMA)

A project started by Elida Maiques, planted in community during IMMA Earth Rising Eco Art Festival 2022.

A biodiversity haven where willow (sally/salley/salix) is coppiced yearly after flowering and fruiting. Willow rods are cut, harvested and stored for later use in weaving. The stools (tree stumps) remain alive, kept at ground level or up to 70cm.

This native tree is a truly sustainable material, it supports hundreds of species and is the basis for traditional arts such as willow weaving.

Livable futures for all will include willow.

The Sally Garden fits in a wheelbarrow.

A biomulch mat pegged with salvaged chopsticks helps the young trees establish.
A thick layer of bark mulch retains moisture and the biomulch mat in place.
Different willow varieties in striking purple, yellow, green, blue, selected by willow weaver Ciaran Hogan.