GOLDEN
TEACHER
Presented for Horizon Festival 2023
Date: 25 August – 3 September 2023
Location: Old Ambulance Station Nambour/Namba
Detail/Materials: Hand-built ceramics, metal leaf, candles, and found objects (1.6 x 1.07 m)
Acknowledgement
Golden Teacher was made possible through support from Horizon Festival, with special mention to Aimee Gray, Hannah Clissold (Festival Director), Travis Macfarlane & Charlie (Lighting), and the two other exhibition artists, Jordyn Burnett and Fat Dog, for all their lovely guidance and support!
Development Space was also made available through 2nd Space an initiative of ArtsCoast – Spaces for Creatives program by Sunshine Coast Council.
Final thanks to Megan William for her mentoring with the project.
Golden Teacher is an autobiographical, site-specific sculptural installation that navigates memory, ancestry, and psychedelics. Drawing its title from the Golden Teacher (Psilocybe cubensis) known for its psychoactive properties, the work employs golden hues and recurring mushroom forms as metaphors for revelation and transcendence.
Hand-sculpted objects rendered in unglazed porcelain are embedded within the installation, each functioning as a symbolic motif. An anthurium references the artist’s grandmother; a water bird and turtle evoke fertility, while geometric forms register paternal loss. The new moon suggests cycles of birth and renewal, and a coiled, sleeping snake embodies the dichotomy between peace and fear. Six ceramic floor rings, derived from personal visions, radiate outward, forming a spatial diagram of something ineffable.
Incorporating Christian iconography (informed by medieval visual language and the artist’s own religious upbringing) the installation situates itself within a framework shaped by the desire to seek something greater than the physical self.
MAKING OF DOCUMENTATION HERE
