Ritual Mammets: A Temporal Encounter

Major Final Project

Mammets (Catacomb), 2018
Sara Jayne Harris

detail from Mammet (Atchin'-tan), 2018
Sara Jayne Harris

In preparation of my forthcoming MA Fine Art Show (28th Aug - 1st Sept, UCA Farnham) I have been toiling over the display of my recent Mammet series now that these figures have evolved and burgeoned into scaled, anthropomorphisms. The turning point in my research project was when I visited Blain Southern Gallery, London in July, and was struck by the ingenious assemblages by the american artist Edward Kienholz (see post 20/07/18). The eclectic use of materials seemed to generate an aesthetic which held my attention. The combination of found materials and their embedded histories is a formula which could be applied to my artworks. The balance of found objects and applied material forms, keeping to a limited palette of colours and textures, brought the works to life. Material substitution for figurative forms became the subject of my working process. The tension in the clamped casing around an old wooden tennis racquet was echoed in the contorted, grimacing head atop the handle. The Mammet was balanced on a discarded block of wood salvaged from a derelict site. The traces of a white painted line on a shawn block showed man's previous intervention with the material. The connection between these pieces creates a layered narrative. 

detail of "Mammet Conversations", 2018
Sara Jayne Harris

Layering is a key element in the work and achieved through a variety of devices. A soundscape accompanied the tableaus for additional sensory experience but also to act as a narrator's voice for the work. Research into Romani dialects has informed the "Mammet Conversations" in the sound and text works. There is a temporal aesthetic to this work; there is a sense of the past but also the present and the future. Atchin'-tan is a stopping place, a camp for travelling societies to temporarily stay. The audience is invited into my 'Atchin'-tan' and encounter the Mammets' rituals and stories. 

The MA Fine Art private view is Thursday 30th August, from 5pm until 8pm, at UCA Farnham, Surrey.