Soil is crucial to every part of life on Earth - it provides us with food and shelter, it prevents droughts and importantly it acts as a Carbon sink - trapping carbon and preventing it from being released into the atmosphere.

Years of neglect and mass farming techniques including tilling, mono crops and the use of harmful pesticides and fertilisers have resulted in the death of vital microbes living in the soil as well as extreme damage to fungal networks living below. This has caused soil to lose its nutrition and structure which stops it from holding water causing flooding. During droughts and high winds the top soil blows away. Not only does this mean that it’s becoming harder to grow crops it also means that the crops that are being grown and sold on are lacking vital nutrients.

People that eat from these damaged crops have been found to be at higher risk to cancer, inflammation, arthritis, autism to name a few. The effects of neglected soil effect all of us and it’s important to create spaces that can help people to gain a better understanding as to how can we all be taking greater care of our soil.

To better understand our human relationship with soil, I spent a lot of time looking at the different ways that it is used.

Soil:

provides us with food

provides us with shelter

keeps us cool

keeps us warm

clothes us

detoxes us

grounds us

provides us with oxygen

traps carbon under its surface

...

I spent time being with soil, thinking about what it feels like to hold soil -

- what does it smell like and what is it without its service to us as humans and animals?

it is... dry / wet / gritty / soft / cushiony / smelly / dusty / damp / brown / red /

black / musty / it moves / it falls / it compresses / squishy / changeable / it is clay / warm / cool / hard ...

Thinking about the ways in which I would carry out my own soil research coming from an artists eye, it was the materiality of the soil that spoke to me. For millions of years humans, animals and plants have used soil as a building material and a home. I wanted to celebrate the creation of warmth and structure out of soil using ancient techniques in a contemporary way.

Reading and looking at a wide variety if sources ranging from scientific, artist, environmental and agriculture perspectives, it was the way that soil is referred to and treated that intrigued me the most.

Often referred to as dirt, soil is held of different importance to differing groups. The Tamil refer to soil as Mother Earth they believe that soil is the source of all life and so it should be treated as such. In Western countries, soil is often referred to as dirt, it's cast aside and disregarded.

Looking at artists such as herman de vries, Robert Smithson and Gary Simpson, gave me great insight into the different ways of approaching a project as vast as looking at soil. herman de vries makes work looking at the collection and archiving of the colours of soil through his earth rubbings. A vast project shown at the Venice Biennale in the Dutch Pavilion.

Gary Simpson undertook a project collecting soil from 193 countries around the world. The project spanned 20 years and was left unfinished before his death in 2019, but his aims for the project are well documented through the kickstarter campaign:

https://www.kickstarter.com/projects/1782785035/commonground191/description?lang=it

Both artists seek to archive soil through their projects, herman de vrie's looking at the beauty and differences in pigments that soils from around the world can create. Gary Simpson's work looks at the importance of soil geopolitically - the soils were collected with the vision to mix them and present them trapped within a large 196 panel fresco.

image of compost mono print made from soil pigments, Tegen-mor Tossell

Reading so many different sources I found that the value of soil is precious to everybody that thinks consciously about it. Famers, gardeners, activists this list goes on. Soil is crucial to the success and sustainability of all life on Earth. I began to ask myself, then why isn't it treated as such?

Words like dirty and muck came to mind. Soil has been branded as something to be avoided - washing detergent adverts showing muddy children and animals with a mother looking on in despair.

I realised that in order for people to start paying attention and caring about soil, it needed to be rebranded in a clean and modern way.

People already know about the Climate Crisis and the changes that are happening with our environment, we hear about it a lot. But without creating experiences and spaces for people to interact with the subject, how are they supposed to relate to it?

I started to think about shops, specifically lifestyle stores - places that sell beautiful things for an aspirational lifestyle at high prices. By rebranding soil as a sought after commodity I could successfully capture peoples interest in the subject of soil.

Creating a shop where people could come and have an experience interacting with the soil, in a familiar yet unusual setting, felt like the perfect way to create conversation and thought about soil.

I reached out to letting agents and landlords of every empty, suitable shop that I could find but kept being met with 'no.' before stumbling across St Nicholas Chapel on The Island in St Ives. The Chapel has a rich and mysterious history - its age is unknown, a sacred place overlooking the whole of St Ives and the bay that surrounds it. A place where locals and visitors alike walk and meet and look out at the sea and the worn. When the Chapel was being renovated in the 1970s Bernard Leach gifted some tiles, depicting fish and boats, linking the Chapel to its surroundings. The rich history of the meeting of art and place in St Ives reflected my project, for nearly 100 years artists have sought out the famous St Ives light.

Curating a brand looking at the value of soil and placing it within such a special and sacred chapel felt apt - I wanted people to feel the importance and sacredness of soil and to connect with it in a new way.

soiled

/sɔɪld/

adjective

dirty; stained.

"a soiled T-shirt"
having been disgraced or discredited.

"a chance to repair their soiled reputations"

- Oxford English Dictionary

I repurposed the word soiled, realigning it to the brand of the shop. A space to celebrate all things soil - to interact, think and value all that soil is. Through visiting the shop, the audience become Soiled.

The relationship between artists and shops is interesting, it removes the need for galleries and curators - a space that can be more transient and experimental than traditional venues. A place for community and fun, shown most powerfully through Tracey Emin and Sarah Lucas' The Shop. A place spoken about by many but listed by few, it allowed the artists to make work, sustain themselves and create a buzz of interest surrounding them and their community.

Farm: was a project by Something & Son, an urban farm, social enterprise and visionary meeting point where the future of farming and food production in cities welcomes in the community. The operation ran as an urban farm, cafe and meeting space allowing the public to come face to face with the future of farming. A successful project targeting the ever increasing need to modernise food production in more sustainable and practicle ways.

In both of these projects the idea of inviting the community in to the spaces is something I wanted to replicate with Soiled, a place where people can explore the material experience and potential of soil through different mediums. It also provided a space to talk about my work and the importance of soil and art and activism with others.

In November, I went to a talk local to me in Cornwall by Holly Whitelaw, an activist for soil health, in St Just. She spoke about the relationship between soil health and gut health which filled me with new insight into the foundational importance of our soil. The way that she spoke about soil was amazing and suddenly all of the pieces of research that I had been doing fell into place and I understood how one affects the other. It filled me with new confidence to take to Soiled when the shop opened and I needed to explain the importance of the work to visitors. I was overwhelmed by the generosity of Holly who was eager to help with the project in any way that I needed, offering advice, time and a microscope so that people could look at soil up close.

Coming away from the talk I was reassured by the turn out of people from such a small community all interested in learning more about the importance of soil health.

Earlier in 2022 whilst on residence at CAST in Helston I looked the materiality of soil within the locale of Helston. During the project I made works using soil as a material, collecting clay from Lowland Point on the Lizard Peninsula I made palm sized clay pieces to mimic the feeling of squeezing a handful of soil. I wanted them to be a peacekeeper for the real thing, something to be carried in pockets and held any time the keeper felt they needed grounding.

The project opened my eyes to the many different ways that soil could be used as a material and I started to experiment with using it as a building material.

Watching Wang Bing's The Man With No Name, I saw how the man in the film held soil with such importance, using it to grow his food but also mixing it with a little water and plant material to mend his home.

I began to experiment and research the use of cob and decided to make a series of bricks using soil from various sacred and special sites close to me in West Penwith.

The process of making the bricks was amazing, mastering the right mixture of soil, clay, hay/straw, sand and water as well as the best way to dry them out during the dark and damp winter months. Stacked on top of the woodturner provided them with just enough heat to draw out the moisture leaving behind, solid beautiful bricks.

Branding was a crucial part of the work, lifestyle stores are about signing up to belong to something exclusive and aspirational. T-shirts were the perfect way for people to join this 'club' of soil fans, a way for people to literally wear their pretend membership to an exclusive group.

I bought white cotton T-shirts in a variety of sizes before treating them with a series of soya milk mordant baths and a tree bark mordant dip and eventually letting them stew in a pot of soil dye.

I embroidered 'Soiled' onto the chest of each of the T-shirts, sitting on top of the wearers heart. The soil dye made a beautiful variety of tones, varying from pale yellow to a deep rick pinky brown.

A walk on the beach got me thinking about the practice of taking sand home from the beach on holiday and how I could relate this to Soiled. St Ives is a busy and popular holiday destination, overrun with holiday cottages outnumbering residents on many streets within the town.

Thinking about raising the value of soil, I began to think about how I could package and sell soil from special sites in West Penwith. I collected soil from Zennor, a special place with a rich history of artists and writers as well as the infamous story of the Mermaid of Zennor, as well as Carn Galver - a stone outcrop overlooking engine houses, moorland, derelict farmhouses and the sea.

In the Summer of 2022 there was a guy wild fire on the moors on the coast path at Zennor, the smoke engulfed our house a few miles away for days. Walking along the coast path in November, the scorched earth was black

I bagged them in small hessian bags, something that could be used as a pot, sowing seeds directly into the soil growing them along before planting the whole thing in the ground to decompose and grow. I embroidered the names of the sites onto the bags, rooting them and the project to place.

After attending the talk by Holly Whitelaw I wanted to create something that related to the fungal networks and roots that live in the soil. I made a net using muslin strips dipped and rubbed in soil, the piece speaks of the conversations and relationships happening within the soil, but is also reflective of the history of St Ives as a fishing harbour with the chapel looking out towards the sea. It would have been a lookout and a place of comfort and community for the wives and children of the fisherman out in storms.

I knew from the beginning that the atmosphere that I created within the chapel would be crucial, not only in reflecting the importance and sacredness of the space but also the value of the soil. Creating an experience, I believe, helps to spark conversation and invite people to engage with the subject.

I visualised the project after visiting the space, through drawings.

Lifestyle stores are often described as 'carefully curated' spaces, I brought in branches from an olive tree at home to hang from the beams, as well as festoon lights and starburst lights. The Chapel is a dark granite building, with thick walls and deep windows looking out to sea. The lighting, as well as candle light made the space cosy and warm, inviting people into a space that is normal closed to the public.

I made candle holders from the same mixture as the bricks, the combination between the rough texture of the soil and straw in comparison with the beauty of the candle light helped to illuminate the space. Bringing the warmth and the elements inside of the space.

I opened the shop the Saturday before Christmas, the weather was beautiful, with dolphins in the bay, overlooked by the platform around the back of the Chapel. The shop sat on top of a grassy outcrop overlooking the whole of St Ives and Carbis Bay, It's a popular place for visitors and locals to walk and look out at the town.

The shop was incredible busy, with people excited to be able to take a look inside if the space and to interact with the work on show.

Holly Whitelaw and her intern arrived with the microscope, allowing people to look closely at the soil samples that she had taken from her garden at home in St Just. Sat within the shop it felt almost like an opportunity for a sacred blessing between people and the earth with it being sat on top of the lectern. Holly provided great support to me, sharing her knowledge on all things soil.

I asked a friend of mine, Maisie Marshall, to come and photograph Soiled. Maisie is a fantastic photographer and has done a lot of work with various brands alongside her own practice.

Asking Maisie to come and take images of the space, allowed me to focus on interacting with the visitors in the shop. Talking about the project, process and the value of soil.

At 3pm on the Saturday I had an unexpected visit from Extinction Rebellion. They were conducting a peaceful march through St Ives, visiting the Island to let off flares and take photos outside of the iconic Chapel.

The timing was amazing, the light was perfect and I had a sudden surge of people coming in to the shop interacting with the work, talking about the importance of soil and their own soil at home.

The Sunday was wet and windy, I opened the door in the morning after a windswept walk up the hill to The Chapel. The floor was wet from rain forced underneath the door in the fierce winds overnight, a poster that I had attached to the front door has disappeared.

But the space felt cosy and safe, protected from the elements. Much the same as the way that the shop acts as a protective space for appreciating the value of Soil.

Visitors were fewer, with less people out walking on The Island, but it allowed me more time to speak and interact with the people that did.

A high school science teacher from the States, stayed and spoke for a long time - he told me about the best way to be able to see living organisms through the microscope. A combination of special dipped slides and oil to stop the sample from drying out over the heat of the bulb.

There has been lots of interest in the project, with opportunities to engage with project in different ways and spaces and to share it within publications.

I'm planning next to make a book, a catalogue of soil documented on my travels. Each page a picture of soil with the exact location it was taken. A way of documenting the rich variations in the worlds soil.

An image of a segment of the work from Soiled on display at The Gallery, Dartington as part of the Arts & Place Show, 2023.