Beehive ✿ Stories of the insect world

Garden of Stories

Julie Bartholomew, Habitat 2, 2022, earthenware, terra sigillata, H 40, W 25, D 40 cm, photography Greg Piper

The beehive contains stories of works made and inspired by the insect world, including bees, ants, butterflies, beetles and dragonflies.

You are welcome to visit the beehive every 4 June, the day of Mushi­ kuyo when we pay tribute to the insect world. On this day in Japan, Buddhist services are held for the numerous insects that lose their lives during the local rice harvest.

“The butterfly counts not months but moments, and has time enough.” – Rabindranath Tagore

The Kalange ✿ Local knowledge created from recycled denim and clay - Katesi Jacqueline Kalange works with the children of Nubuke in Ghana to create a home for the story of Badere, the spider who hoarded knowledge.
Sensorium recipe ✿ In praise of insects - To conclude the Sensorium series, we offer you a recipe for a poly-sensory ceremony that acknowledges creatures whose value is seriously underestimated.
Chefs who make - Lee Tran Lam finds four remarkable chefs who make their own tableware, uniquely crafted for their specialist dishes.
Ajiwau: A Japanese way of savouring life - Euan Craig shares his life at the wheel in a Japanese pottery village, where he makes tableware that helps savour the food and its moment.
Terra ferment: Three recipes - Ilka White shares three recipes that reflect the same grounded sensibility that she applies to her weaving practice.
Vivalto Lungo: Espresso bridal jewellery - We ask Annika Karskens about the origins of her jewellery made from coffee pods.
Tack Skogen: Beauty in the blemish - MADAM Snickeri celebrate the wood that the industry rejects, finding beauty in the stains, holes and deformities.
Habitat: Terracotta homes for hard-working bees - Prompted by devastating bushfires, Julie Bartholomew produced cool but water-tight terracotta hives that reflect their ovoid form in nature.
iQweqwe: Towards the ancestors - The Cape Town ceramicist Madoda Fani takes the road to success and finds his way back home.
Water, Wood and Wild Things: Learning Craft and Cultivation in a Japanese Mountain Town – review - D Wood reviews a book about Yamanaka, a village in a "nether region" of Japan where beautiful traditions linger.
fluxed earth ✿ Garden forage vases - Kirstie Murdoch & Rye Senjen share their daily bush walk and the vases that provide a place for what we ourselves might gather.
Ayvu Rapyta ✿ A selection - Andrea Ferrari presents a part of her translation of Ayvu Rapyta, the sacred myth of the Mbya people of South America, compiled in the twentieth century by Leon Cadogan
Cupinzeiros: Back in touch with childhood - Lidia Lisbôa creates her cupinzeiros (termite mounds) as a way to stay in touch with her childhood home.
Butterflies metamorphose into jewellery - Paryana Puspaputra works in partnership with a Butterfly Park to make precious jewels from the broken wings they leave behind.
From glass beads to smoke water: Investigating the vocabulary of loss and renewal in the landscapes of the Yilgarn Craton - In seeking to draw the landscape of Yilgarn Craton, Greg Pryor discovers mysteries of reflected light in Western Australia.
Ngurra: Finding our way home - Glenn Iseger-Pilkington finds a sense of home with the Ngaanyatjarra community, grounded and connected through Country.
Muslin. Our Story – Saiful Islam - An extract from a new book by Saif Islam about the most diaphanous of fabrics, muslin.
With the tip of a needle - Melinda Rackham looks into the Guildhouse Traditional Crafts program, and finds how some migrants to Australia are building new lives for themselves from the craft skills they brought with them.

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