The Spirit is a Bone took the form of a creative intervention within the Derby Museums Visual Poetry of 1001 Objects gallery from May 2013 to January 2014. Continuing with its aim to inspire curiosity, a bespoke desk-bureau with a number of drawers by my collaborator Paul Evans was nestled within the space. Within the recesses and drawers were a series of peculiar drawings based on the various natural history specimens that were displayed within the Fragments of Bone display; the drawings hint at half-truths, scientific misapprehensions and origin tales of dubious veracity.
Connected with the drawings were a series of epigrams I’d created, some based on the ancient Anglo-Saxon tradition of riddle poems – poems wherein the object speaks.
The desk-bureau was designed as an interactive intervention, with space for visitors to continue the dialogue between collection, artist and audience by leaving a drawing or text piece of their own,