So What is A Reliquary?

The completed reliquary

A reliquary is an ornamental vessel from the middle ages that often housed relics such as fragments of Christ’s cross. They were often elaborately decorated. I decided to make a reliquary when I became fascinated by this history in my study of Celtic customs. This has formed part of my Parallels in Maori and Celtic culture and houses trinkets of Maori and Celtic symbols.

As usual I decided to make each side from recycled materials. This one is a pentagon shape (5 sided) and each side was completed separately before being joined up the sides with additional embellishment of small beads in the seams. I used a wind cask to create each form of the pentagon. The top triangular parts were folded in and seagrass was attached at the apex. The seagrass was then threaded through the inner of a used up cello tape roll. The ends of the seagrass closings were fixed by threading them through holes in shells picked up on my beloved Mokau beach. This also gave the sea grass a weighted end as well as acting as an added embellishment. To give a more ethnic appeal I have used cockerel feathers on the top (fold in) sections. These ones gleam in metallic colours when the light strikes them. Below you can see each of the sides before final assembly

The five sides before assembly

The left hand side is foil sweet papers with textured yarn (free machine stitched over black net). The second section is an old scarf that had ripped. I added beads in the decorative holes. The middle section is an acrylic substrate painted with acrylic and couched copper wiring detail. Next is a camembert cheese wrapper with textured yarn and black net free machine stitched. The final panel is stitched copper foil left over from another project.

Waste products can look quite different when subjected to processes to create a textured surface.