about
Jacquie Follett is a ceramic artist whose courageous work reflects on her own health struggles and the fragility of life. Employing original methods refined through meticulous experimentation, she creates impossibly fragile, translucent layers of porcelain clay formed into a shape that is recognizable as ‘home’. This form represents the stability which she derives from friends and family, her faith, the familiarity of her home and the comforting daily rituals and routines found there.
The flakes of porcelain resemble handwritten diary pages. These suggest both joyful days and painful times which, paradoxically, have helped build her resilience, and the ever-present question ‘how many more days?’ The constantly fragmenting surface evokes the erosion of self that is experienced in serious illness. The firing process itself, with its chance outcomes, echoes the traumas and difficulties of human life, and in her own case, the destructive treatments she continues to endure.
By underlining the dialogue between fragility and resilience she invites viewers into a place of inner reflection and deeper self-acceptance.
This project is based on moments in time. The titles of the pieces are taken from excerpts of my diaries and phrases I have used. Read more below…..
life_time
Another day another hospital, I’m sorry I couldn’t find a vein first time
telling my kids I have cancer, another 3 needles today
I just feel like I’ve been poisoned. Can I say no to this?
I’m afraid your cancer has spread and now it’s incurable
I don’t know how to live! Hello I’m Brian, I’ll be giving you your treatment today
my body is radioactive, the kindness of strangers disarms me
kicking a big log on my walk in the woods, crying in the hospital stairwell
finding out the chemo’s not working, spending time with a dear friend
3 different hospitals this week, scanxiety, crying in the hospital toilet
my children need me to bear this, a tough exhausting day at work
the terrible wig shop experience, the stupid thoughtless things people say
you can fight this you’re strong, people insisting I will get better when that’s not the case
people being surprised I’m still alive, people mistaking me for my husband’s new wife!
kindness at the hospital parking machine, going for a stomp to clear my head
a baby shower for my first grandchild, hospital sandwiches – the final insult
getting to see my daughter get married, hours wasted in waiting rooms
horribly painful liver biopsy, I need to get out of here, an afternoon in the veg patch
putting my life in the hands of other people, utter sheer thankfulness at being alive
Jacquie enjoys discovering and expressing historic and social narratives through clay and mixed media. She is interested in deep themes of mortality, faith, human vulnerability, justice and redemption. Her recent work is her most personal yet.
She develops her work through hands-on interaction with the material, exploring its possibilities and enjoying the challenge of pushing the clay to its limits.
She is based near London in St Albans, UK.