Anne Vibeke Mou uses glass composition and diamond- point engraving (by hand) to transform botanical and mineral elements into glass objects that weave together histories and ancient landscapes in contemporary contexts.
In Hinterlands, two cornucopias or horns of plenty, Wild Things Inwards (2022), explore the landscape of the North Pennines through glass aesthetics, recipes, raw materials and their connection to the land around her studio. The artist has melted vintage tableware, which she has reworked into objects decorated with grasses and moonwort. These works bring together histories of lead glass crystal developed to imitate rock crystal, the toxic legacy of lead mining, rare upland habitats, early chemistry and glass embodiment of transmutation.
The moonwort plant (Botrychium lunaria) has a rich history connected to the manipulation of metals and appears to tolerate contaminated ground. It was referenced by alchemists in their pursuit of the transmutation of metals and in folklore and witchcraft for its powers over metals. A mysterious plant with a mostly subterranean existence, it is found on the Northern Fells amongst flora surviving from the end of the last ice age.
The cornucopia is associated with harvest, nourishment, fortune and infinite abundance; spiritual, agricultural and mineral. Mou’s glass horns of plenty emerge from fragile environments that exist above and below ground into translucent forms laden with mythologies from the Greek, Roman and Norse. In a nod to her Danish heritage and the fifth century Golden Horns of Gallehus – stolen and melted down for profit – Mou playfully recycles objects with a heritage of feasting and aspirational splendour. |