This fascinating conversation was recorded at the Rembrandthuis museum in Amsterdam, where I had the pleasure of speaking with The Rembrandt House curator, and the former head of paintings conservation at the Rijksmuseum. We were discussing the paintings of the 17th century Dutch artist Rembrandt van Rijn: about Rembrandt’s pigments, the evolution of his painting process, and the art of painting conservation. My two guests couldn't be more perfect for this podcast because they have both been at the forefront of both unveiling and sharing the latest discoveries into Rembrandt’s materials..

Petria Noble is the former Head of Paintings Conservation at the Rijksmuseum, a position she held between 2014 and 2022. She is a researcher specialised in paintings by Rembrandt van Rijn, and an expert in the material aspects of his paintings. Prior to joining the Rijksmuseum, Petria worked for 18 years as a Paintings Conservator at the Mauritshuis museum in The Hague.

Leonore van Sloten has held a position as curator at The Rembrandt House Museum in Amsterdam since 2005, here she’s responsible for various exhibitions and publications on Rembrandt and related themes.. She initiated and curated amongst others the 2019 exhibition Rembrandt Laboratory: Rembrandt’s Technique Unravelled, the exhibition that we discuss in this conversation, which shone a spotlight on the world of scientific research into materials and techniques.

I'm Maddie Rose Hills, and you have been listening to The Mater Podcast

Find images from our conversation on the Mater Instagram account: https://www.instagram.com/mater________/?hl=en-gb

Related links

Rembrandt House Museum: https://www.rembrandthuis.nl/en/?gad_source=1&gad_campaignid=692326751&gbraid=0AAAAADSRQune0nZ9wB8TfU1tnowVtWEeI&gclid=Cj0KCQiA0KrJBhCOARIsAGIy9wBP9jrDMiXcvx-b-bCP7UN7yffJpwk_csoiU9bx7erGmLeE_ftk9gkaAhFcEALw_wcB

Petria Noble: https://dutchmethodunfolded.humanities.uva.nl/?page_id=474

Leonore van Sloten: https://www.leonorevansloten.com/

Mauritshuis: https://www.mauritshuis.nl/en?gad_source=1&gad_campaignid=1613811005&gbraid=0AAAAADuJqF0q5DhmqQoriFVNj5wZ7Kuwt&gclid=Cj0KCQiA0KrJBhCOARIsAGIy9wC2-pIUMtAUUgxiUzjJYrDJNwt6u8xX_5m1lWHykc1HmpHLyBsKHNwaAgC9EALw_wcB

Art Matters Journal: https://www.amjournal.org/

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BCB: https://www.britishceramicsbiennial.com/

This year’s programme: https://www.britishceramicsbiennial.com/news/full-programme-announced-for-british-ceramics-biennial-2025/

Clare Wood: https://www.britishceramicsbiennial.com/person/clare-wood/

Burleigh Pottery: https://www.burleigh.co.uk/pages/about-us

ReForm Herritage: https://re-form.org/

Recast programme BCB: https://www.britishceramicsbiennial.com/project/recast/

The podcast that Clare mentions about the Recast programme: https://open.spotify.com/episode/750cQoCFPCXBv8YjQGJWLN

Claire Baily episode of The Mater Podcast: https://podcasts.apple.com/gb/podcast/the-mater-podcast/id1749226924?i=1000694666344

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Welcome back!! Today I'm speaking with Tessa Silva about MILK. Tessa is a British-Brazilian artist whose work considers our collective use of materials from ancient history to the present day. Using craft as a tool to investigate the relationship between culture and nature, Tessa unravels the storied histories of the materials she works with in the knowledge that every material has its own biography. Using milk as her primary medium, Tessa has spent the last six years working with surplus milk proteins as a material to produce bespoke, handcrafted sculptural objects. Titled Feminised Protein, a term first coined by American writer, feminist, and animal rights advocate Carol J Adams to address the exploitation of non-human reproductive cycles to produce food on a mass scale, Tessa’s project exists in dialogue with themes of sustainability, history, nature and motherhood.

The Feminised Protein project has been exhibited at institutions such as the Victoria and Albert Museum in London, the Museum of Applied Arts in Vienna, and at the 10th edition of Future Heritage, curated by Corinne Julius. Tessa has delivered lectures on her practice at the V&A, Henry Moore Studios, and for the British Council’s Circular Cultures programme.

Tessa Silva

Tessa on Instagram

Tessa's Mater text

Esther Leslie's Mater text

Ma-tter Seetal Solanki

Alfriston Clergy

Weald and Downland museum

Hook and Son Farm - raw organic dairy farm

Arts Council England, Developing Your Creative Practice grant

Tessa referenced two other episodes of The Mater Podcast: 'Emma Witter & Krista Mileva Frank' and 'Andrew Cummings & Claye Bowler'

Mater on Instagram

The Mater website

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This week on The Mater Podcast, Evie Hatch, studio and materials specialist and host of Jackson's Pigment Stories, is joined by artist Ginny Elston to discuss The Personalities of Pigments.

Ginny, winner of the Student Award in Jackson’s Art Prize 2023, shares her insights on her collaboration with Unison Colour to curate a series of soft pastels (pictured here). Evie and Ginny also dive into pigments, paint, and their own understandings of colour.

Ginny Elston (Instagram)

Website

Evie Hatch (Instagram)

Jacksons Art (Instagram)

Jacksons Art blog

Jacksons Art Supplies online shop

Jacksons Art Prize

Ginny's Versatility Soft Pastel Set for Unison

Ginny teaches private classes in Edinburgh, held at Scot-Art, (@thescotart) on London Road. It's a local hub for artists in the city with community spaces, studios and galleries.

Ginny’s interview with Jacksons

Links mentioned throughout the conversation

Amy Sillman, On Colour

Rebecca Fortnum, On Not Knowing: How Artists Think

The Mater Podcast episode on the colour blue

Katharina Grosse - colour liberated from the confines of support. Instagram | Website

Ginny’s recommendations for Art Schools

the New York Studio School (@ny_studioschool)

Leith School of Art (@leithschoolofart)

There are some great artists teaching at Black Pond Studio (@blackpondstudio)

Ginny also teaches private classes in Edinburgh, held at Scot-Art, (@thescotart) on London Road. It's a local hub for artists in the city with community spaces, studios and galleries.

Reach out - Mater________ on Instagram

Website - mater.digital

Email - info@maddierosehills.co.uk

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A conversation between artist Claye Bowler and art historian Andrew Cummings about the exhibition Dig Me A Grave, burials, connection to the land , latex, soil, death & more.

Links

Dig Me A Grave dates & venues:

Steam Works Gallery, WIP Studios, Wandsworth, London

https://www.wipspace.co.uk/dig-me-a-grave

21.03.25 - 11.05.25

PV 20.03.25

Auction House, Redruth, Cornwall

21.06.25 - 19.07.25

PV 20.06.25

Yorkshire Sculpture Park, Wakefield

04.10.25 - 02.11.25

A sculpture from this body of work was also part of a group exhibition

Winter Sculpture Park 2025

01.03.25 - 12.04.25

Claye’s exhibition Top (2022) is being shown again at Queer Britain 10/09/2025 - 23/11/2025

Compilation of protests and actions against the Supreme Court: https://whatthetrans.com/compilation-of-protests-against-the-supreme-court/

Fundraising towards five transfem causes in the UK https://www.fiveforfive.co.uk/

Claye on Instagram https://www.instagram.com/clayebowler/?hl=en

Claye’s website: https://www.clayebowler.com/?fbclid=PAZXh0bgNhZW0CMTEAAafm3sQ4CBOg5SYofyAmlntP0rmy1-pJZufTxZbWUseEfV5LruEAwpCwAY3MVw_aem__qa4reKB4fVG85oxlrdUjw

Andrew: https://researchers.arts.ac.uk/2344-andrew-cummings

https://courtauld.ac.uk/research/research-resources/publications/immeditations-postgraduate-journal/immediations-online/immediations-no-18-2021/the-promise-of-parasites/

Fire Choir https://thenestcollective.co.uk/projects/fire-choir

The False Bride, Folk Song that Claye mentions with ‘I’ll lie in my grave until I get over you’

About the Museum Registrar Traineeship: https://ahc.leeds.ac.uk/fine-art/news/article/2675/museum-registrar-traineeship-opportunity-in-leeds-from-september-2024#:~:text=%E2%80%9CThe%20traineeship%20sees%20the%20successful,collections%20work%20amongst%20other%20students.

Brandon Labelle: https://brandonlabelle.net/

Gluck: https://www.npg.org.uk/schools-hub/gluck-by-gluck

Living Well Dying Well - Andrew’s End-of-Life Doula foundation training - https://lwdwtraining.uk/

Grief Tending in Community https://grieftending.org/

Francis Weller, The Wild Edge of Sorrow: Rituals of Renewal and the Sacred Work of Grief, North Atlantic Books, 2015

Camille Barton, Tending Grief: Embodied Rituals for Holding our Sorrow, North Atlantic Books, 2024

Top, at Henry Moore Institute https://henry-moore.org/whats-on/claye-bowler-top/

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Hello! This is Maddie Rose Hills, host of The Mater Podcast.

This week's episode is a little different, and a lot shorter!

I have just got back from a week-long Research Residency at West Dean School of Arts, Craft, Design and Conservation. What is a research residency? Well it can really be anything - but for me it meant wandering around the school, meeting people from lots of different departments, and talking with them about what attracted them to the craft and materials that they were studying or teaching. I wrote a diary while down there and have put together a selection of the thoughts here.

This text can be read on the Mater website: https://mater.digital/stories/a-research-residency-at-west-dean/

Or listened to here on the podcast platform

I will also share more images on the Mater Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/mater________/?hl=en

Find out more about West Dean: https://www.westdean.ac.uk/

Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/westdeancollege/?hl=en

West Dean Fine Art on Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/westdeanfineart/?hl=en

More about West Dean: 'Our schools of arts, design and conservation offer a uniquely broad range of world-leading courses. At the heart of all we do, is our belief that 'making' makes our lives better. We celebrate the intrinsic value of work that has been hand-made by artists and artisans, and challenge the assumption that mass-produced must be the only way because, across the world, the maker movement is growing.'

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Today I am chatting with Lucila Kenny and Barbara Collé about COLOUR

Lucila Kenny is an Argentinean textile designer as well as a researcher focused on Natural Dyeing and the colourants produced by a range of plant species. As a natural dyer and educator she has worked with universities, art academies, fashion designers, biologists and artists exploring, preparing and producing plant colorants for dyeing, inks and paints.

Barbara Colle is a Dutch visual artist and philosopher, investigating our experience of colour. She publishes her findings through essays, artist books and visual essays. On the subject of colour she guest lectures at universities, contributes to publications and curates.

The two have bonded over colour and perception through many conversations and collaborations, so it was very moving to be able to be a fly on the wall for one of their chats. We discuss how colour is changing all the time, and letting go of a desire to control colour when natural dying and while growing pigments. Lucila describes is as seeing that the plants are 'gifting' us, instead of what we want to take. They discuss the language we use to describe colour, and how it says so much about our relationship with it.

Links

Lucilla's website: https://www.lucilakenny.com/ | On Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/lucila.kenny/?hl=en-gb

Barbara's website: https://www.barbaracolle.nl/ | On Instagram:https://www.instagram.com/barbara___colle_/

Indigo website: www.growingblue.info

flower, fruit, leaf, husk and root (book): https://www.lucilakenny.com/shop/book

Braiding Sweetgrass, Robin Wall Kimmerer

Elmer, by David Mckee (the children's book about colourful elephants)

The Color Kittens, Margaret Wise Brown (Barbara's children's book)

Eleanor Irwin, Colour Terms In Greek Poetry (1974)

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This week I’m joined by Andrea Trimarchi and Simone Farresin of Formafantasma. Formafantasma are a design studio who investigate the ecological, historical, political and social forces shaping the discipline of design today. Their extensive client list includes Prada, Hermes, Vitra Design Museum, Fendi, The Venice Bienale, Rijksmuseum, and the National Museum of Norway.

This conversation was recorded at The Stedelijk Museum in Amsterdam, in the middle of feb 2025 just before the opening of Studio Formafantasma’s exhibition Oltre Terra. Oltre Terra is is an ongoing investigation of the history, ecology, and global dynamics of the extraction and production of wool. The show will run until July 13th so make sure to check it out..

Oltre Terra at Stedelijk Museum, Amsterdam - https://www.stedelijk.nl/nl/tentoonstellingen/formafantasma

Formafantasma website - https://formafantasma.com/studio

Formafantasma on Instagram - https://www.instagram.com/formafantasma/

Cambio - https://www.serpentinegalleries.org/whats-on/formafantasma-cambio/

Geo-Design at Design Academy Eindhoven: https://www.designacademy.nl/page/5809/geo%E2%80%94design

Interview with Tim White - Exlana sheep breeder https://vimeo.com/780306084

Artek x Formafantasma collaboration: https://www.artek.fi/en/company/designers/formafantasma

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