A solo exhibiton created for the Edinburgh Festival of Sacred Arts, August 2025, exhibited at the Undercroft, St. Vincent’s Chapel, Stockbridge, Edinburgh.
https://www.edinburghsacredartsfestival.org
Carol Marples: Artist statement
Many of these works have been birthed in the last two years. Much of it reflecting on the darkness of our world right now, much of it created with hope, with prayer and a strong need and belief there is and has to be hope. because and despite of the darkness
Hope that, to quote Desmond Tutu,
Goodness is stronger than evil
Love is stronger than hate
Light is stronger than darkness
Life is stronger than death
Divine seeds of hope can be planted in and as small acts of resistance against the darkness, for seeds planted each day, be it a sunflower seed, an acorn, a prayer, a kindness – can grow a garden, create a forest, transform a landscape, an in-scape, a life, a world. We cannot, despite and because of the darkness afford to give up hope, so plant what seeds you can wherever you can.
Given the huge environmental problem of waste in our throw away society I have purposely recycled and repurposed materials – fragments of cloth, large and small, and teabags, dried, unfolded, ironed and printed on. Sometimes it’s just the joy of working with these materials and letting them speak back to me that forms the work. Creating something new out of discarded materials is always a thrill.
