DONNA ENTICKNAP

I have always collected stones. I bring them home, arrange them in lines on windowsills or specific configurations that just feel right–there’s a specific order to things. A lock and key maybe. A portal back to the land and time they came from, a vessel for the spirit of place. A charm or spell for control and certainty. Like the old folk custom of hanging hag stones to ward off the fears and dangers of the time, I see parallels in my own struggles with obsessive compulsive disorder and anxiety. The need for certainty and the tendency towards magical thinking.

We bring so much of our own history and memory and desire with us into our landscapes, record it into the grass and stone along with everyone else’s, recordings on recordings, a palimpsest of lived experiences. If we could warp back to any point in time, where and when would it be?