Pigment as Pedagogy

The focus of Mayes' practice is the research, making and material culture of pigments. Working across art, craft and material research, she investigates the relationships between colour, place and more-than-human ecologies through the sourcing, manufacture and use of pigments. Her practice is rooted in low-impact methods of production, exploring how colour can be made in ways that minimise extraction while foregrounding processes of regeneration, stewardship and care.

Primary research takes the form of fieldwork to sites of geological, industrial, ecological and cultural significance, with a particular focus on London and the South Coast of England. These investigations inform a practice that extends beyond the studio through teaching, workshops, lectures, performances and exhibitions, positioning pigment making as both a material process and a means of sharing ecological knowledge.

Central to her work is the production of pigments from locally sourced botanical, mineral and animal materials, alongside renewable and waste-stream resources. She works with materials recovered through gleaning, regenerative agricultural practices, organic waste from restaurants and supermarkets, and by-products of the construction industry. By transforming these overlooked materials into colour, Mayes reveals the entanglement of human activity with wider ecological systems, uncovering the local histories, material cultures and more-than-human relationships embedded within a landscape. Through pigment, she seeks to make visible the often-overlooked narratives carried by the materials that surround us, demonstrating how low-impact colour production can foster new ways of understanding place, sustainability and our interconnectedness with the environments we inhabit.

Lucy Mayes 2026

Considering fragments collected from the Thames estuary. Film still curtesy of Neptune Ltd. 2022