ARTISTS STATEMENT
CAROLENA HELDERMAN

I work both functionally and sculpturally with clay. Since my ceramic training at RMIT in 1987, my practice has developed technically and explores a more intimate response to the landscape that surrounds me.
 

In the Strathbogie Ranges; granite boulders, tall white manna gums, dry summers, and the threat of fire; shape both my daily life and my imagination. As a professional native seed collector, I work closely with cycles of regeneration. I gather from the land while witnessing its fragility. Carved surfaces, fractured textures, darkened marks, and forms that suggest both scar and shelter.
 

My current sculptural work reflects the language of ceramics: earth transformed by fire. It draws on the fear and intensity of summer - when animals, people and land meet the possibility of flame.

Charcoal shards, cracked surfaces, buried heat and the glowing embers. My work speaks to the scars left behind on landscape and body, but it also reflects endurance, quietness, and the hope held within renewal.