Fern Thomas

Happy to share that from October I will be a PhD Candidate for the AHRC Collaborative Doctoral partnership with Amgueddfa Cymru @museumwales and @unisouthwales , where I will be based at St Fagan's Museum researching the Iron Age material culture and creating new work through performance (CYM/ENG*) Excited to be building on past work and love for heritage, prehsitory, ritual, animism and polytheism while exploring the meaningfulness in these times of the iron age collection at St Fagans for diverse audiences. Will definitely be considering all of this in the context of climate, relationship with the land and historical forms of reverence for nature 🌿 Image: Iron Age Stone found face down in the river bed, River Twymyn, Bont Dolgadfan in 1971. The features have been worn by the flow of water. Like a moon I thought. Diolch @kathashill for sharing this opp with me and llongyfarchiadau for just being awarded your Doctorate! * edrych ymlaen at ddysgu mwy o gymraeg

The fifth commissioned text for beside/gerllaw, by Fern Thomas, is now available to read on our website! Click the link in bio 🔗 beside/gerllaw is a seven-part writing series created in partnership with Testun testun for Artes Mundi 11. Spirals recur in the work of Antonio Paucar, showing in Llandudno and Cardiff as part of Artes Mundi 11: one of his many motifs recasting inherited aesthetic hierarchies from an Indigenous Andean perspective. Responding to this work, Fern Thomas has pursued her own spirals, in language, drawing and movement, in tandem with practice-based research in Wales’ national prehistoric archaeology collections. @testun__testun ’s programmes are convened by artist-writer (and AM10 journal editor) Dylan Huw. This new independent platform champions expanded art and writing practices across Wales. -- Mae pumed rhan cyfres beside/gerllaw, gan Fern Thomas, ar gael i’w ddarllen nawr ar ein gwefan! Cliciwch y ddolen yn y bio 🔗 Cyfres o saith comisiwn sgwennu yw beside/gerllaw, wedi’i greu gyda Testun testun yn rhan o Artes Mundi 11. Mae troellau’n ymddangos drosodd a drosodd yng ngwaith Antonio Paucar (sydd yn Llandudno a Caerdydd fel rhan o Artes Mundi 11), fel ffordd o ail-lunio hierarchaethau esthetig o safbwynt brodorol Andeaidd. Fel ymateb i’w waith, mae Fern Thomas wedi dilyn ei throellau ei hun, mewn iaith, darlunio a gwaith symud, dan ddylanwad ei hymchwil yn ein casgliadau archaeoleg cyn-hanesyddol cenedlaethol. Caiff rhaglenni @testun__testun eu rhedeg gan yr artist-awdur Dylan Huw. Mae’n blatfform annibynnol i feithrin arferion sgwennu/celf gyfoes yng Nghymru. @_fernthomas @antoniopaucar_g #ArtesMundi11 #NationalLottery @celfcymruarts @bagrifoundation @cardiffmet @colwinstoncharitabletrust @art_casw @derekwilliamstrust @britisharts

Hi Venus in Leo. Here’s my Scrying Mirror or ‘Spirit Mirror’ cast in solid beeswax which I made for my solo exhibition at @glynnvivian ‘Spirit Mirror’ in 2022. The mirror is based on that used by 16th century occultist John Dee (of Welsh decent, really into the Merlin prophecies...) which is now housed in the British Museum. It was used for divination and for communicating with angelic forces and spirits. This beeswax version has purposefully been made for the use of scrying as part of a magical practice; the beeswax needs tending and warmth to reveal the shining reflective surface. This object formed part of the body of work I developed at Glynn Vivian where I worked with the gallery’s collection, museum artefacts and an installation of a large tent like structure which housed an oracular beeswax owl. It responded in part to the life of spiritualist Winnifred Coombe Tennant who advised Glynn Vivian on the purchase of some of their collection. For the exhibition I also curated works by William Blake and Victor Hugo as Coombe Tennant was a great admirer of them both. My friend Sam Mukumba helped to cast the Spirit Mirror in beeswax, there are four in total, one for each of the four directions. One of them will soon be available in the upcoming open exhibition at @orieldavies ✨ If you think you would like one of these beeswax mirrors to form part of your magical practice on general surroundings - reach out! 1) Beeswax Spirit Mirror in summer sun 2) Image of John Dee’s scrying mirror in obsidian 3-5) Installation shots at Glynn Vivian including detail of William Blake angelic wing printed on tent 6) one of the mirrors in our house

Awakening Blodeuwedd, curated by @legionprojects and hosted by @house_of_goblin was a recent exhibition inspired by the work of Alan Garner, and particularly The Owl Service, which reimagines the Blodeuwedd story, a flower woman turned owl, from Y Mabinogi 🦉 For this exhibition I made a series of small assemblages thinking about magical symbols, hidden objects and the strange associative charge that certain materials can hold. I kept returning to the hollow in The Owl Service, the place where Gwyn reaches into the tree and draws out fragments and artefacts from another time. The alcoves the works sat within began to feel connected to that space somehow, part hiding place, part shrine, part portal. Shapeshifting is something I have been exploring in my PhD research recently, so it was nice to get to explore it here, particularly with the vintage edition of The Mabinogion, with the illustration by David Jones on the cover, which seems to either capture or release an eagle owl from its pages. The hanging eggs with pencil drawn talons were made from eggs laid by our hens, specifically our white hen Princess Leia. Coincidentally we also have a hen named Blodeuwedd, but her eggs are brown and did not quite fit the aesthetic! I also made a new riso print, a kind of reworking of a print I made a few years ago with @_owengriffiths Making More Myth Making. Thank you so much to Legion Projects for the invitation. I always notice that I make better work when invited into a conversation or theme. Images: 1. Shapeshifter, book and feather 2. She wants to be flowers, but you make her owls, vintage contact frame and stone found in our garden. 3. Making More Myth Making riso print, edition of 100, installed at house of goblin. 4. Always it is owls, eggs with pencil line hung on thread, installed at house of goblin. 5. Always it is owls, detail 6. Making More Myth Making original drawing 7. Shapeshifter in my work space. 8. Installation image at house of goblin.

Calan Mai Hapus 🌼 Sumer is icumen in. I spent May Eve on pilgrimage around Glastonbury with @pilgrimtrust . A day of song, story and myth, walking through abundant hedgerows, with the scent of May blossom as our other guide, and carrying our questions as we walked. Thinking about vortices and underground aquifers, and learning how central water is to the experience of the town, we drank from the sacred springs and came to our journey’s end at Chalice Well, where images of Ceridwen, St Michael, dragons and Arthur swirled through my thoughts. Thank you @drguyhayward for guiding us and for the work you do with The British Pilgrimage Trust, helping people to connect with landscape and place in this way. 🐉

Awakening Blodeuwedd opens today Thursday, 6-8pm, and is on throughout the weekend! Presenting the artists taking part in the exhibition: House of Goblin @house_of_goblin + Tom Sewell @tomsewell + Fern Thomas @_fernthomas + Seán Vicary @sean_vicary + The Broom Cupboard @dohmshop & @matthewroberthughes The exhibition is inspired by the landscapes, iconographies and mythscapes of cherished author Alan Garner, with a particular nod to The Owl Service (1967). House of Goblin will also be running ceramic and plate decorating workshops during the weekend- if you are in town for @neoancients come by and say hi! Curated by Úna Hamilton Helle & Matthew-Robert Hughes of @legionprojects

Divination 🥚 Playing / preparing work for Awakening Bloedeuwedd with @legionprojects @house_of_goblin 🪶

Legion Projects x House of Goblin present ‘Awakening Blodeuwedd’ - an exhibition, events and workshops inspired by Alan Garner. During @neoancients festival, @house_of_goblin will host an exhibition curated by @legionprojects with works by The Broom Cupboard, House of Goblin, Tom Sewell, Fern Thomas and Sean Vicary, inspired by Alan Garner’s work, with a particular nod to The Owl Service. In said story young protagonist Alison discovers a dinner service stored in the attic of an old Welsh Manor house. Through tracing and interpreting the patterns on the plates, she awakens a dormant, cyclical story rooted in the Welsh myth of Blodeuwedd. Inspired by this moment, ceramics workshops by House of Goblin will invite participants to step into Alison’s role — using decoration, repetition and mark-making as a way of engaging with myth. Talks by House of Goblin and Alice Lowe + Matthew-Robert Hughes and Blue Firth will explore Garner’s wider influence. This will be the first step towards a more prolonged and deeper engagement with Garner’s work, landscapes and influence. More info to come!

Dydd Gŵyl Dewi Hapus 🌼 some 🏴󠁧󠁢󠁷󠁬󠁳󠁿things from archives, some 🏴󠁧󠁢󠁷󠁬󠁳󠁿things from my archive: 1. Image of cake with some archival Welsh Ladies made by Johana Hartwig @artshellimages for my performance at @glamarchives as part of my residency there 2. The photograph from the cake. Welsh Ladies looking serious, coven-like 3. Ladi Witch Yn Y Ffynnon ~ a description of a watery themed children’s game from a book at Glamorgan Archives 4. Image from the Glamorgan Archives Margery Lewis Collection showing the Peace March from Cardiff to Brawdy, protesting nuclear weapons factory 5. Crafts, Customs and Legends of Wales’ 1980, from the library at @glamarchives 6. Image of Ancestor Worship: a cycle of 18 poems by Emyr Humphries, 1970 7. Badge from our collection (@_owengriffiths ) 8. Image taken at the crazy golf, Skewen Park, 2020 9. My child encountering a dragon, of sorts, when she was smaller 10. Image of Polaroid of Y Fari Lwyd and hidden children within the sheet. Taken by @saakieaip as part of the film For a Spell, 2020 11. Iron Age carved stone head found face down in the river bed, River Twymyn, Bont Dolgadfan in 1971. From Amgueddfa Cymru’s Archaeology collection (and part of my current PhD research) 12. Some Wales related books from my collection that I did a flat lay for for some reason that I can’t remember. 13. Photograph taken in Ceredigion for the Eisteddfod, 2022 14. A horse shoe nailed to a post near National Botanic Garden of Wales, image taken a few years ago 15. Another photo taken in Ceredigion for the Eisteddfod, 2022 16. Image from a pub in Dinbych when some of us Future Wales Fellows gathered for eating, discussing and late night karaoke 17. Still from For a Spell, Mari Lwyd with many children’s legs. Film work by Pia Eikaas. Filmed days before world was struck by lockdowns, February 2020 18. More books. Folklore, welsh witches etc. 19. A real life bard, Eisteddfod in Cardiff Bay 2018 20. The daily climb of Dylan Thomas’s face during lockdown. Cwmdonkin Park, 2020 (@_owengriffiths ) 🏴󠁧󠁢󠁷󠁬󠁳󠁿

Winter + Slowness. Finding ways of stretching out the Wintertide, naps as research, candlelight as wayfinding, holy nights, hen galan, an orchard in need of a wassail, seeking out the garden’s nature spirits. #ephiphany *book gifted by @rhodrijd

Collab with @_owengriffiths from 2018. Made for SMUDGE CLEANSE at Kvit Gallery, Copenhagen, curated by @saakieaip [Celtic Janus Head, Roquepertuse]

Went to visit the fairies and the ancestors yesterday for All Souls Day at Craig y Ddinas / Dinas Rock, where my Grandfather comes from - Pontneddfechan (Waterfall Country). When I was 21 we scattered my grandfather’s ashes here and ten years ago yesterday, with a baby strapped to our back, we scattered my grandmother’s ashes there also. My parents could only walk so far so I turned round and captured them as light at the end of the tunnel.