Strung Out (detail), 2023, wax, human hair, feathers, mixed media, in vitrine, 184 x 78 x 68 cm. Photo: John McKenzie

Richard Bright: Can we begin by you saying something about your background?

Claire Morgan: I grew up on the outskirts of Belfast at the tail end of The Troubles – I was getting ready to leave school when the Good Friday Agreement was signed in 1998. My family is not artistic. My dad was a teacher, and my mum, who died very young, was a nurse. I don’t remember my family placing a great importance on art and culture when I was young – as kids we were brought to the museum to look at the dinosaurs and the mummy in its sarcophagus and that’s about it. But I had an instinct to draw and make things, and so I did. There were books about the usual dead white guys – Van Gogh, Picasso, Dali – in the art room at school where I spent a lot of my lunchtimes, but what I really loved was poring over fashion magazines, taking clippings of haute couture dresses, making my own (crazy, though in hindsight, terrible) garments. I didn’t really know anything about contemporary art until I left Belfast and went to study Sculpture in Newcastle upon Tyne.

Rib, 2023, fox skin, found textiles, mixed media, 220 x 55 x 30 cm. Photo: Nicolas Brasseur

RB: What is the underlying focus of your work? In particular, what are the thinking processes and knowledge practices that guide your artistic research?

CM: My practice has followed a trajectory from control towards vulnerability, and I would say this reflects my personal experience and life choices. It comes out of searching for ways to navigate grief, to find ways to exist in the world in spite of it. I don’t see it as therapy, though it is increasingly about direct and honest communication, and all of the challenges that come with that.

We have so much in common – with each other, and with other species. I’m interested in the dysfunctional relationship we (in contemporary western society) have with the natural world of which we are tiny parts, and how that is shaped by our reluctance to acknowledge our mortality, our status as animals, and our increasingly unshackled notions of self-importance.

Bloom (detail), 2023, wax, bluebottles, nylon, in vitrine, 176.5 x 73 x 73 cm. Photo: John McKenzie

RB: Have there been any particular influences to your ideas and work?

CM: It’s a difficult question, because I think that as an artist, really, every single thing that ever happens to me goes on to influence my work on some level.

I think I discovered Bourgeois’ cells pretty early on and was fascinated by the idea of creating something closer to an environment than a sculpture. Also Arte Povera, Penone’s young saplings revealed within beams of processed timber. A lot of my earlier work borrowed from Minimalism, but I think I was always approaching that from a perspective where it didn’t make sense to me. I played with it formally, introducing nature, introducing death and the endless complexity that does in fact exist in the world. Lately I have enjoyed reading and listening to artists discussing how they approach their work; people like Barbara Hepworth, Kiki Smith, Tracy Emin, Paula Rego.

But perhaps the things that have influenced my recent work the most have been experiences of loss and grief, misogyny, mental health struggles, neurodivergence, and self-discovery; learning the ways that so many strong individuals (artists or otherwise) have faced similar challenges head on, and through this, finding ways to accept who I am, despite what I have been taught to the contrary.

I only dared to touch you once I knew that you were dead. Exhibition view. L-R: Stoop,2023, traces of taxidermy process, watercolour, pastel, pencil, on paper, 76 x 57.4 cm; Bear, 2023, traces of taxidermy process, watercolour, pastel, pencil, on paper, 57 x 75.8 cm; Drawn, 2023, glazed stoneware, mixed media, 255 x 73 x 73 cm. Photo: Nicolas Brasseur

RB: In your recent exhibition, I only dared to touch you once I knew that you were dead (2023), you created a body of figurative work that situates women in unison with animals as central protagonists. Can you say more about his exhibition and its aims?

CM: This is my first figurative body of work, with interactions between humans and animals being at its heart. These interactions have to do with grief, fear and longing. The bodies depicted are imperfect and vulnerable – cracked and discoloured, torn, stitched and patched. They move between tenderness and confrontation, in an unfolding, fractured narrative. This exhibition is an exploration of our fear of the unknown, of losing control. It is about actions and consequences, hopes and realities.

I only dared to touch you once I knew that you were dead, 2023, 32 page concertina fold book, drypoint and collagraph with hand colouring, edition 1 of 3, 32 x 565.6 x 17.7 cm. Photo: Nicolas Brasseur

All the bodies featured are sites of significance, vulnerability, and agency, that deliberately challenge the well-worn trope of body or being as commodity. My interspecies relationships demand a potential reimagining of how we relate to ourselves, each other, and our environment.

The inevitable heat death of the universe, 2023, wax, human hair, bird skins, mixed media, 350 x 380 x 380 cm. Photo: Nicolas Brasseur

RB: One of the works featured in the show, The inevitable heat death of the universe (2023), shows a woman surrounded by hanging bird skins. Can you say more about this work?

CM: On entering the gallery, the viewer immediately encounters The inevitable heat death of the universe. The form of a woman stands in the centre of the space where the skins of many dead birds are suspended, silently drifting and rotating in space, as if to rain down over her. Between her outstretched hands she holds a horizontal cord onto which many birds are tied, imperfect and with rudimentary repairs. Its function is ambiguous. It is not clear whether she has collected these in order to cover her own vulnerable body, or to present them to us, or in the hope of making them airborne again.

Everything is moving away from everything else. Scientists think that the universe will end with a heat death. This is not the inferno that the name might imply to a layperson like me. In science the word heat is used to mean disordered energy. No machine is 100% efficient, so over time, the disorder in the universe increases. This can apply to the cosmos. And though events on such a cosmic timeline have no bearing on humans – we will all be long gone before this comes about – there are so many resonances with the way we move through the world.

The more wasteful a machine, the faster it will reach a state of maximum entropy. When maximum entropy is reached, a heat death will occur.

And of course, when I think of those resonances, I do think of global boiling, of an inferno of our own making. This work has something to do with making mistakes, grief and longing, back pedalling, futility, and making do.

L-R: You could be my mother, 2023, pastel, charcoal, on stained birch board, 168.8 x 150 x 3.2 cm; Dead Weight, 2023, wax, human hair, fox skin, mixed media, 165 x 50 x 55 cm. Photo: Nicolas Brasseur.

RB: A number of images in the show depict a woman holding a fox. What is the significance of this? (I’m thinking of works such as Show of Strength and You could be my mother)

CM: The image of a woman holding a fox has gestated over many years.

I am interested in the fictional stories we conjure to protect ourselves, and our subjugation of others as a result of acting on these stories. I make no attempt to give the animal skins the illusion of life, nor do I disguise their imperfect state. I am navigating our breaking points, the tension between vulnerability and power, between communion and colonisation. It conjures the age of mass extinction we are entering, implicates us all, and invites us to consider our own role in this collective act of destruction.

I worked with a life model to realise these works. I invited her to explore unnatural and uncomfortable positions, while in direct contact with the skin of a fox. She cradled and supported it, explored it, listened to its silence, smelled it. It was a process that involved a great deal of trust, patience, and endurance.

Show of Strength, 2023, pastel, charcoal, on stained birch board, 180 x 240.2 x 3.2 cm. Photo: John McKenzie

The pose in Show of Strength relates directly to the imagery within the exhibition’s eponymous concertina-fold book, along with the darkly comic, abject presence that inhabits its shadow. These shadows are something like the sense of violation or intrusion that bubbles up from finding communion with another being, or with “nature” in its truest sense. The things we try to hide, or hide from, that horrify us.

There should not be anything titillating or entertaining in these depictions of the female body. This was not about representing beauty. There is also the essentialist notion that women are fundamentally closer to nature. The romance of this creates a fallacy that is easy to indulge in. But these images are based in reality, simultaneously grim and fragile, not an idealised fantasy. There are attempts at communion, at tenderness, at stillness and care, but as I worked with the model it quickly became clear that I must not hide this foxes state of death. In You could be my mother, we can see the metal props that supported the skin, and the way its legs are folded in unnatural directions.

I could be your mother, 2022, drypoint with hand colouring on paper, edition 5 of 10, unique by hand finishing, 43.7 x 51.5 cm. Photo: John McKenzie

Hide, 2023, pastel, charcoal, on stained birch board, 169.9 x 149.9 x 3.2 cm. Photo: John McKenzie

In another work, Hide, the fox lies over her head, and we can see the drawing pin on the floor behind, tethering a taut thread tied to the fox’s jaw. In all the images we can also see the skin of the fox’s lips falling away to expose the jawbone (like the foxes in the sculptures), and the hollows where the eyes should be. While these small elements of horror do not dominate the sentiment of the works, they are vital.

We desperately need to cultivate a tenderness towards other species. Though the ground we must build on is broken, it can still be possible.

Double, 2023, pastel, charcoal, on stained birch board, 170 x 150 x 3.2 cm. Photo: John McKenzie

Shoulder, 2023, traces of taxidermy process, watercolour, pastel, pencil, on paper, 76.3 x 57.8 cm. Photo: John McKenzie

RB: There are also works that involve ‘Traces of taxidermy process’ (for example, Shoulder and Bear). Can you say more about this?

CM: I am always moved by the process of handling the dead bodies. I find it both deeply disturbing and fascinating to touch these dead beings and to understand not only that these things were once alive, and that the intangible spark of life is no longer present, but also that it can seem so utterly normal.

Before starting to work on an animal it is necessary to take many anatomical measurements and notes, and this has become the starting point for my blood drawings (which include Shoulder and Bear), where I allow the bodily fluids and measurements of the animals to mark the paper.

Bear, 2023, traces of taxidermy process, watercolour, pastel, pencil, on paper, 57 x 75.8 cm. Photo: John McKenzie

For each of these particular works, I have chosen to elaborate on the spontaneous marks made in the taxidermy process, by making a detailed study of a woman becoming a cradle or resting place for the bird whose bodily fluids have marked the page.

My blood drawings have come to encompass a broad range of scales and processes, but the persistent thread that connects them is my repeated and futile attempts to quantify the physical body, and the fleeting movements that a body may make in life and in death. I am also aware of my own role in the way those bodies move. It makes me think about how we as humans manipulate the world around us. We are just another species of animal, but we dominate the world in a way that no other species does, in as much as our impact is felt worldwide in plundered habitats, the climate crisis, and mass extinction.

Fold (detail), 2023, found textiles, fox skin, mixed media, in vitrine, 186.5 x 71 x 71 cm. Photo: John McKenzie

RB: Pushing the boundaries of the medium is a natural part of the art making process because, in some ways, the artist is exploring the medium itself. What boundaries do you wish to push with the medium that you use?

CM: I think as an artist you always need to be pushing the boundaries of something, or else you’re not learning or changing. Within this body of work, I expanded the visual vocabulary of my practice in many ways – through the scale and presence of my drawings, the use of wax, hair, textiles, printmaking, wood, movement.

The taxidermy process has been part of my practice for many years, and my approach to it has changed a lot over time. Whereas with older work I was very conscious that must I “honour” the animal by attempting to restore it to a state of perfection, I now feel that there is something stronger in acknowledging the reality of its imperfect state, and rather than trying to hide this in the new work, I have intentionally drawn attention to it through embroidery.

In making this work I am mindful of the ways in which taxidermy is historically entangled with colonialism. I would argue that placing the animal body front and centre, making work that talks about the animal, can encourage urgent questions about the rampant subjugation of animals across so many facets of contemporary western society, as well as the state of denial that we currently exist in. The planet really is starting to boil, and we continue to do so very little about it, because it is more convenient to pretend it will all be ok in the end.

With this in mind, I would like to mention that animals are never killed for my work. It may seem surprising that I should find so many at once, but the current body of work includes specimens that have been found or donated to me over a period of up to 15 years in some cases, and stored in my freezers since then. Even where animals die accidental or unavoidable deaths, the sad fact is that humans usually have a part to play, whether directly or indirectly (for example birds being hit by cars, flying into windowpanes, or mistaking plastic for food).

Child (detail), 2023, found textiles, mixed media, in vitrine, 179 x 66.2 x 66.2 cm. Photo: John McKenzie

RB: What future projects are you currently working on?

CM: The body of work we have been discussing has just toured to Galerie Karsten Greve in Paris, and the exhibition will continue there until 6^th January 2024. I am also part of the group show, Seismic, currently at Giant Gallery in Bournemouth, UK. Beyond this, I am working on exhibitions and commissions in Austria, Northern Ireland, Switzerland, and England, though I can’t go into more detail about these just yet!

New projects are announced via my newsletter which you can subscribe to at www.claire-morgan.co.uk and on Instagram and Facebook @clairemorganstudio

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All images are © Claire Morgan, Courtesy Galerie Karsten Greve, Paris, Köln, St. Moritz.

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