Continuing of the collective thinking that Casco and DAI undertook as the COOP study group 'Reframing Climate Colonialism: Pleasuring the Radical Imagination', in 2021-22 Clementine Edwards (DAI, 2018) will be a Gerrit Rietveld Academy fellow in the Jewellery–Linking Bodies department, working around the subject of craftwork and climate colonialism. A guiding concept, and form, is the miniature.
‘In the reign of Harad IV there lived at court a maker of miniatures, who was celebrated for the uncanny perfection of his work. Not only were the objects of his strenuous art pleasing to look at but the pleasure and astonishment increased as the observer, bending closer, saw that a passionate care had been lavished on the smallest and least visible details. It was said that no matter how closely you examined one of the Master’s little pieces you always discovered some further wonder.’ Steven Millhauser
During her time, Clementine will explore aesthetic strategies and develop works that map the connection between colonialism and climate crisis. A guiding concept, and form, is the miniature. By devoting herself to studio practice that, while 'ambitious', is neither bombastic nor grandiose, Clementine wishes to evoke wonder through the tiny and continue to de-link her work from cultures of (material) extraction. In particular, this means focusing on femme work, complex work, anti-heroic work.
Clementine's work is guided by the research line material kinship, which thinks kin beyond bloodlines and material beyond extraction. In 2022 Onomatopee will publish The Material Kinship Reader, co-edited with Kris Dittel.