Kristin Luke: Shop Mine Flyer Flower Skull

Shop Mine Flyer Flower Skull is an exhibition of new works by Kristin Luke. It arises from Oriel Machno, a gallery in the rural Welsh village of Penmachno where she lives, which has constituted her creative practice for the past 5 years. Luke has built Oriel Machno with community constituents as a complex site of interdisciplinary discourse and practice. In this space, artists hold exhibitions; farmers demonstrate sustainability; third sector organisations convene meetings; crafters sell goods. It is a space that cultivates a social ecology.

The immersive installation will present newly created artworks alongside found objects, ephemera, and artefacts. It highlights an accumulation of communal knowledge around different conceptualisations of ecology that was developed in Oriel Machno as a result of Isdyfiant, the rural residency Luke undertook in 2023, organised by Mostyn. Each object embodies a particular entanglement between people and ecological models of thought, manifested in diverse ways: the risograph as communication technology; a quarry worker’s meditative hand carving of slate; the use of wildflowers as medicine; a communal bread oven; self education in underground quarry cabins. The exhibition elements capture intersections between different knowledge systems, time scales, and sets of human and non-human relationships in the Machno Valley. It considers how ecological thinking can inform imaginaries of resistant communality, particularly in rural contexts. 

Shop Mine Flyer Flower Skull is indebted to the community constituents and local experts who collaborated with Luke during the Isdyfiant residency: the Oriel Machno steering group and volunteers; Will Bigwood (National Trust Farm Manager); Gareth Alun (Maths Teacher and Model Conservationist); Anna Farrall (Designer); Andy Houghton (Wildflower Expert); Bethan Jones (Archaeologist); Rhodri Owen (Artist); Iago Thomas (National Trust Peatland Officer); and Ann Williams (Crafter). Luke will co-deliver a programme of events at Mostyn with some of these collaborators, which activate the exhibition as a space for discussion and experimentation. 

Kristin Luke (born in 1984 in Los Angeles, California, USA and based in Penmachno, Eryri, Wales) works across film, installation, and participatory projects focussing on the utility of art in situated communities. 

Exhibition kindly supported by Natural Resources Wales and Clear Village.