Calthemitic Sticky Thinking
Images from WIDER THAN LIVING alongside Art Archaeologists Iain Davidson, Lara Band, Harry Payne, Diane Eagles.Northlight Gallery, Stromness 15 - 24 November 2025
Calthemitic Sticky Thinking
A project investigating trans-life collaboration with matter as mentor. The matter being Calthemite, a pseudo-karst also known as ‘urban stalactite’ which ‘grows’ under aged concrete urban architectures.
In response to finding pollutive airborne particulate fossilised in calthemite, this study investigated calthemite as ‘archaeologists of airs’, as a creative earth system member potentially able to collaborate and mentor across life worlds. Together we would attempt to unravel their material pasts by tracking down possible sources of the concrete from which they seep.
Through this journey I encountered many different and intersecting flows of matter, minerals and human plastic wastes, evidencing a continuum of matter flows interrupted by human activity which lead me to seek the route of a chalk slurry pipeline that lies 57 miles long between quarry and factory under the surface in the UK Midlands. I decided I wanted to listen and record the turbulent chalk moving steadily through this huge hidden structure.
Jane Bennett’s vital materiality(1) and Mark Fisher’s interpretation of the uncanny(2) combined provided theory to draw the character of weird, creepy and wet lithic agency onto both calthemite and the hidden pipeline and signposted a possible speculative and mystical approach in art archaeology creative practice.
It was important to me to try to practice humility in ecological understanding to navigate different vulnerabilities produced within a trans-life collaboration and uncovering calthemite pasts rather than continue the extractive mindset to minerals that dominate landscapes. So an artwork of 16 awareness cards that sat alongside my searching presence in that landscape seemed appropriate.
1. Bennett, J. (2010) Vibrant Matter: A political ecology of things. Durham: Duke University Press.
2. Fisher, M. (2016) The weird and the eerie. London: Repeater Books
MA Contemporary Art & Archaeology Final Project. University of the Highlands & Islands.
Calthemitic Sticky Thinking
A project investigating trans-life collaboration with matter as mentor. The matter being Calthemite, a pseudo-karst also known as ‘urban stalactite’ which ‘grows’ under aged concrete urban architectures.
In response to finding pollutive airborne particulate fossilised in calthemite, this study investigated calthemite as ‘archaeologists of airs’, as a creative earth system member potentially able to collaborate and mentor across life worlds. Together we would attempt to unravel their material pasts by tracking down possible sources of the concrete from which they seep.
Through this journey I encountered many different and intersecting flows of matter, minerals and human plastic wastes, evidencing a continuum of matter flows interrupted by human activity which lead me to seek the route of a chalk slurry pipeline that lies 57 miles long between quarry and factory under the surface in the UK Midlands. I decided I wanted to listen and record the turbulent chalk moving steadily through this huge hidden structure.
Jane Bennett’s vital materiality(1) and Mark Fisher’s interpretation of the uncanny(2) combined provided theory to draw the character of weird, creepy and wet lithic agency onto both calthemite and the hidden pipeline and signposted a possible speculative and mystical approach in art archaeology creative practice.
It was important to me to try to practice humility in ecological understanding to navigate different vulnerabilities produced within a trans-life collaboration and uncovering calthemite pasts rather than continue the extractive mindset to minerals that dominate landscapes. So an artwork of 16 awareness cards that sat alongside my searching presence in that landscape seemed appropriate.
1. Bennett, J. (2010) Vibrant Matter: A political ecology of things. Durham: Duke University Press.
2. Fisher, M. (2016) The weird and the eerie. London: Repeater Books
MA Contemporary Art & Archaeology Final Project. University of the Highlands & Islands.
Image of calthemite fragments printed on voile through which a view of Stromness Orkney can be seen
Calthemite Sticky Thinking Academic Poster
Calthemitic Sticky Thinking Deck
Calthemite deposit in Coventry
Magnified image of Calthemite in Coventry showing fossilised airborne particulate
Searching to listen to the Kensworth Pipeline research image
Research image - lime mortar calthemite, Carew Castle, Pembroke
Research Drawing for Calthemitic Sticky Thinking MA Contemporary Art and Archeaology project
Pipeline crosses a canal in Rugby
Stickiness Card and image of calthemite fragments printed on voile
Display of Calthemitic Sticky Thinking Deck, Wider Than Living, Northern Light Gallery, Stromness
Calthemitic Sticky Thinking, Wider Than Living, Northern Light Gallery, Stromness
