Clare Peake

12 glass vessels containing perfume made from flowers and plants collected in my garden over the course of a 12-month period.

Glass fabrication: Ruth Allen

A Thread of a Spider (Portal A and B) (2024) are two woven and stitched portals that aim to physically move matter from one space to another. Made from collected muslin baby wraps, hair and gold thread repurposed from past works, the embroidered interlocking circles are based on medieval apotropaic marks, or “witch marks”. The symbols are intended to catch demons blowing through the air and keep them spinning on the wall. The marks both free you from your potential demon but also paradoxically keep it there with you. The title of the work is taken from Edgar Allen Poe’s short story “A Telltale Heart” (1843) in which the narrator is tormented by the eye of an unknown figure. His torment ultimately results in the demise of both characters. The particular line used in the title comes at a point of illumination in the story for both characters. The unknown figure awakens as a small slither of light from a lamp hits the victim’s eye, a portal is open. At the same time the narrator feels vindicated and feels an unstoppable sense of compulsion to carry out his plan. A Thread of a Spider is both a window to potentiality but also a record of everything that has passed and held together with a tenuous thread.

Image 1: Clare Peake, A Thread of a Spider (Portal B), 2024. Muslin baby wraps, hair, gold thread, plastic eyes, 160 x 160cm.

Image 2 and 3: Installation images of "Talisman: Power and Charm" (Broome Sail Makers Shed, 2024). Artwork by Jacky Cheng, Vanessa Margetts, Angela Bakker, Eva Nargoodah and Clare Peake

Image 4: Clare Peake, A Thread of a Spider (Portal A), 2024. Muslin baby wraps, hair, gold thread, plastic eyes, 160 x 160cm. Images courtesy of Canberra Contemporary Art Space and Brenton McGeachie

Image 5: Documentation of ‘witness, collector, archivist, narrator’ curated by Sydenham International for the Canberra Biennial. Images courtesy of Canberra Contemporary Art Space and Brenton McGeachie

Image 6: The Procession (Part 1: Portal), 2022. Found and reused materials. 100 x 100 cm. Photo: Rebecca Mansell.

The Procession (Part 4 – Cloak) (2024 – ongoing) is an incomplete and inaccurately cut wizard’s cloak made from old bed sheets, past works and many failed starts. It is embroidered with motifs representing significant moments that have occurred over the course of its construction. As the weight and material of the garment accumulate over time, it simultaneously falls apart and is reconstructed or repaired. It is amonument to the passing of time and the process of creation as both productive and wasteful. 

Image 1: The Procession (Part 4 – Cloak), 2023 – ongoing. Studio scraps, test pieces, failures and project remnants, dimensions variable. Image courtesy of Canberra Contemporary Art Space and Brenton McGeachie


Image 2: Documentation of ‘witness, collector, archivist, narrator’ curated by Sydenham International for the Canberra Biennial.

Artwork featured by Emma Buswell and Clare Peake. Image courtesy of Canberra Contemporary Art Space and Brenton McGeachie

The Procession (Part 6 – Ring) (2024)

A pair of rings inspired by Rene Magritte's painting The Lovers II. The two rings are identical with the design based on a sun dial and contain both a bowel and a blade.

Fabrication and design assistance: Max Butcher

This is a series of severed heads made from small figurines (self-portraits) that exploded in the kiln. The same mistake was repeated and refined; perfected in the resulting series of heads. The heads themselves reflect feelings of loss, of being lost and of the difficulty in finding yourself again.

9 to 5 Rings (2018). Stirling silver, ashes, hessonite garnet. Fabrication and design assistance: Max Butcher & Rose Megirian (Many Peaks Assembly)

Each of the seven rings contains the ashes of my past visual diaries from 2015 to 2017. The stone, a hessonite garnet cut in the shape of a pyramid, was chosen for it capacity to assist with transformation, mental anguish and to aid in clearing confusion, providing wisdom and confidence.

A Sorcerer’s Dress was originally a blanket made from all the failed works, test pieces and scraps accumulating in my studio from 2016. The intention was to give them status and honour or transform them in a symbolic gesture and as an important part of my practice. The blanket was then embellished with gold and velvet, and turned into a shamanic coat of sorts; a vestment ready to be worn as part of new rituals for making.

In 2018 the garment was taken apart and reshaped into a burial shroud that reflected changes to my personal circumstances and also on ideas of transformation and alchemy.

The work was disassembled following its’ exhibition in 2018 and over time the parts were reformed into this carpet. The 2021 iteration of the work has become a hopeful moment to the process of creation and time spent in the studio.

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100 Hands of God  (2017). Ceramics, dimensions vairable. Photograph: Courtesy of Document Photography and Verge Gallery, Sydney

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Intermediate Pots  (2015- ongoing). Ceramics, dimensions variable.

Images 1: Photographer, Eva Fernandez

Image 2: Installation view Ramsay Art Prize, Art Gallery of South Australia, 2017. Photographer, Saul Steed

Images 3– 4: Photographer, Eva Fernandez

Remaining images: Courtesy of the artist, Installation view Seventh Gallery, Melbourne and Broome, WA

In this body of work titled Intermediate Pots is a series of Greek inspired vessels recording the banalities of everyday life in the studio and in Broome. Their construction has become both a diary and contemplative action on procrastination in the studio with their title referring to not only the point before an idea becomes apparent, but also to my experience of Broome being a middle or in-between point; in a state of liminality. This quality of perhaps unsteadiness is reflected in the shape of the vessels in that they are both formed and unformed at the same time; solid and wonky. Likewise, this quality also reflects a state of mind, sitting in a middle ground between two points. 

The construction of the work started shortly after my arrival in Broome and production continues endlessly marking the passing of time. Noticeable differences occur across the different periods of production, the pots document seasonal, environmental and social changes occurring, slowly morphing to focus more on documenting internal thoughts or evaluations of their own construction. Changes in skills and technical developments are also evident.

Currently there are over 90 vessels in this collection.

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Middle Ground: Not either of two things (2015). Video loop, dimensions variable.

I spend more time with my dog than any other being in my life so I guess it was inevitable that he become an important part of my practice. He is sometimes a muse, sometimes the devil and sometimes the baby Jesus. Most of all he is my greatest form of procrastination. In the work Middle Ground: Not either of two things I reinterpret my studio companions steps into a simple tap routine. With ruptures, imperfections and sometimes points of unison, this duet of sorts not only reflects our relationship but also demonstrates the creative potential of what started out to be procrastination in the studio.  This dance becomes an illustration of our relationship, wasted time and an allegory for exploring the movement between ideas and the generation of new thought patterns. 

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Tap Code – SOS (2015). Video loop, dimensions variable.

How to generate ideas and navigate through what we already know to arrive at what we do not, and how to conjure up something that we haven’t yet thought about are overarching questions underpinning my practice. Tap Code – SOS uses a prisoner invented communication system to rhythmically tap out the code for SOS. The introduction of Tap to my practice has been motivated by the desire to learn a new skill and fill in the wasted time spent in the studio. Putting this new skill to use, in this video I send an endless open callout in the hope for a response. 

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Certain Passage (2012 - 2016). Hand woven carpet of various gold materials. 80 x 120 cm.

Historically the carpet is seen as containing or depicting the hopes and dreams of the maker for a better life, physically and metaphorically woven into the carpet. Through the long journey to complete this work, and through many failed starts and ends, weaving this carpet became a form of slow, repetitive, procrastination. It became a meditation hovering between two states of mind; my physical reality and an imagined space of where I’d rather be. The final work and the addition of the text after the completion of the carpet became a declaration of the works' failure, and my efforts, which ultimately and unexpectedly achieved the original aim of the carpet by creating the possibility for hope, potential and personal resurrection. 

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The Torment (2015). Recycled past works and studio scraps. Dimensions variable. Photographs: Eva Fernandez. 

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Propositions (2012 & 2015). Recycled past works, studio scraps, graphite on paper. Dimensions variable.

Photographs : Courtesy of PICA, Perth and 55 Sydenham Rd, Sydney 

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Prima Materia (2012). Unfired recycled clay. Dimensions variable.

Photographs: Courtesy of PICA, Perth 

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A comprehension of the farthest points (2013). Recycled past works, studio scraps, graphite on paper. Dimensions variable.

Photographs: Bo Wong

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Dust  (2014). Recycled past works and studio scraps. Dimensions variable. Photographs: Eva Fernandez. 

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Rumours of Strange (2011). Mixed media, dimensions variable. Photographs: Bo Wong

A series of objects constructed from the descriptions of the weather and various plants and animals found in Captain Cook's travel journals.

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Eclipse (2012). Air dry clay, hand-blown glass, graphite on paper (drawings). Dimensions variable. Photographs: Casey Ayres

The clay objects were constructed using a simple hand gesture and pressure. These objects were then verbally described to a glass blower and constructed with one breath and movement of the fabricator. The corresponding series of drawings attempt to illustrate this process of exchange both in ideas about form and the physical forces used to create the objects. 

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Pilot (2011). Mixed media, dimensions variable. Photographs: Casey Ayres 

2008 PICA residency, Perth WA

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A Series of Serendipitous Occurrences (2008). Mixed media, dimensions variable. Images courtesy of the Fremantle Art Centre, Perth WA.

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The Indeterminacy Principle (2007). Mixed media, dimensions variable. 

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Footnotes (2007). Floor work constructed of mixed media, dimensions variable. Installation view. Image courtesy of Fremantle Art Centre, Perth