Holly Slingsby, Felled, yet unfurling (preparatory drawing), 2024. Acorn cap and knopper gall inks on paper. 25 x 18cm. Courtesy the artist. 

Free event

A new live performance work made especially for St Mary’s Abergavenny, Felled, yet unfurling takes the recumbent bodies of the wooden Jesse sculpture and stone monuments within the church as its starting point. The work synthesises these with other iconographies of holy figures – such as the wounded Christ and the pregnant Madonna – to present the body as a vessel for transformation and newness.

The Jesse depicted within the church was cut off from the tree traditionally sprouting from him, but here mourning is combined with regrowth. A prone figure pulls items from her garment which accumulate in a meditative ceremony, a ritual act of healing and rebirth.