Motherlode
Ancestral Stories, Poems, & Art
A Collaborative Exploration of Intergenerational Storytelling, Embodied Experience, and surfacing the Un-nameable
There is a moment, sometimes, when a story rises in the body before it reaches the tongue. A memory, an image, a sensation that belongs both to us and not to us. The Motherlode is our attempt to listen more closely to these places.
In the next cycle of this work, between February and July 2026, I am returning, alongside Moi Tu, my creative partner, to complete the one hundred conversations exploring motherlines, lineage and the threads that travel through families. This is not a project with a fixed destination. It is a practice of listening, witnessing and tracing what moves beneath the surface of our ordinary lives, wherever we are in the world.
The work unfolds slowly. Some conversations will become poems, some will inspire artistic responses, and some may simply remain what they were: moments of human connection that opened something for both of us. You are welcome to take part if you feel a pull towards your own lineage and would like to explore it with care.
An Invitation to Join the Conversation
The Motherlode is an invitation into a one-to-one conversation about ancestry, memory and motherlines.
We are inviting people from all walks of life, anywhere in the world who feel curious about their lineage, their family stories, or the ways intergenerational experience lives in the body. You do not need to arrive with a clear story, a tidy history or a particular outcome in mind. The work begins from where you are.
At the heart of this project is a simple offering: time, presence and deep listening.
What Is Being Offered
You are being offered an in-depth, 90-minute recorded conversation, held with care and attention, at no financial cost.
These conversations are part of a wider creative and listening practice in which we are gathering one hundred voices exploring motherlines across generations. Our intention is not to extract stories, but to listen deeply enough that something deeply honest can surface, whether that takes the form of words, images, sensations or quiet recognition.
Alongside the interview, we invite you to a shorter conversation beforehand, to connect and get a feel for each other and the conversation ahead. Please book 30mins with me here
How Participation Works
Participation in The Motherlode involves two conversations:
A 30-minute connection, alignment or check-in call, book here
A 90-minute recorded interview, which forms the heart of the work, book here
Interviews are held online and are offered Wednesday to Saturday. General time windows are shared before booking, and you are then invited to choose a time that works for you.
Intimate conversation
A one-to-one space to speak about your motherline, ancestry and whatever feels present or alive for you.
Creative practice and reflection
At the close of the conversation, there is a 15 minute creative reflection practice. You may receive a poem, image or other creative response as part of the gift of this work.
Collective wisdom
Our conversation becomes part of a wider, anonymous tapestry of voices that honours the diversity and complexity of human experience across generations.
What you can expect
What We Are Creating Together
Through these conversations, we are slowly gathering:
A tapestry of voices exploring motherlines across cultures and histories
Creative responses that arise from embodied listening
Reflections on family patterns, inheritance and intergenerational care
A space for the un-nameable: feelings and experiences that resist neat explanation and which carry meaning and resonance
This work is offered as a gift.
There is no fee to take part in a Motherlode conversation. This is intentional; it allows participation regardless of circumstance, background or means.
The project sits within a gift-economy approach. I offer my time, attention and listening without expectation. Some people who value the work choose to support it financially, through buying art, or through other forms of generosity. Others simply take part, receive the conversation, and carry whatever moves or shifts arise into their own lives and relationships.
Often the reciprocity is indirect. A change in seeing travels into families, parenting, care, or community. This, too, is part of the exchange.
If you would like to support the ongoing work, there are optional ways to do so below. Participation itself does not require contribution.
If you would like to support The Motherlode financially, you can do so here.
If you would like to support The Motherlode through art, you can do so here.
Click here for more about gift economy practice
Why This Work Is Offered As a Gift
Practical Details
Between 1 February and 4 July 2026, I will be hosting 33 further interviews to complete the second third of the original impulse of this work.
Conversations take place online via Riverside using Google Chrome
Interviews last 90 minutes
Participants are invited to ensure they have time to settle and digest afterwards
You will receive:
A private audio recording of your conversation
Often, a short creative response that emerges from the call
Before booking, please complete this form in which you will find the booking links. All the questions are optional.
The Motherlode is held collaboratively.
Alongside my own listening and writing practice, this work is supported by:
Moi Tu, artist and facilitator, who supports the creative reflection process
Amy Isles Freeman, artist and ritual space maker, whose work holds the project physically and symbolically
More about the people holding this work can be found here.
Who Is Holding This Work
All conversations are recorded for the participant’s own use and for private creative reflection within the project.
Nothing from your story will be shared publicly or used in any creative output without your explicit consent. Most conversations remain entirely private. The emphasis is on collective wisdom rather than personal testimony.
Privacy and Care
Joining the Conversation
If this work touches something in you, you are warmly invited to take part.
You are not required to prepare anything.
You do not need a “good” story or “complete” endings & experiences.
The invitation is simply to arrive as you are, and to speak into a space held with care.
Before booking, please complete this form in which you will find the booking links. All the questions are optional.
Here is a flavour of Moi’s art - born out of The Motherlode
Before the shape of this next phase became clear, Moi and I recorded a short introduction to the earlier cycle of the work. At the time we imagined it might become a book, or a crowdfunded project: something we could name neatly.
The work has shifted. Listening has led us somewhere more open, more spacious and far less defined.
The video is here because it captures the heart of what we were reaching towards: the call to listen more deeply, the gratitude we felt for the stories already shared, and the sense of something larger wanting to come through. Please watch it with the understanding that this next phase is different. The invitation remains the same.