Death by stone

Death by Stone is grounded in an old European custom once carried out on the 26th of December: the hunting of the wren. According to legend, a wren betrayed Saint Stephen by song, revealing his hiding place and leading to his death by stoning. In retaliation and to secure good fortune, communities would capture and kill the bird each year, turning it into both a scapegoat and a charm.
The piece sits inside that reciprocal violence, a cycle of blame and consequence in which death answers death. The wren here is not rendered anatomically but reassembled; wing, leg, and body positioned by instinct rather than fact, reflecting how myth reshapes the body to serve the story. The fire agate set into the head follows the line of the beak and eye, its white band mirroring the pale stripe found on the bird itself.
Fire agate traditionally symbolises protection, grounding, and the transmutation of harm. Its presence becomes an inversion of fate: the stone that once condemned the bird now inhabits it. What was silenced by stone now carries stone as witness.
This work inhabits the tension between superstition, sacrifice, and storytelling, a memorial to both the voice that sparked a martyrdom and the creature made to bear its cost.