ancestral memory – MISRYOUM speaks with artist Maddy Inez about ceramics, inherited spiritual legacies, and gardening as resistance.
A bowl can be more than a vessel: for Maddy Inez, clay becomes a living archive of healing, lineage, and ancestral memory.
On a practice level. the Los Angeles artist’s work moves through ceramics and printmaking. but its emotional logic is remarkably consistent.. In conversation with Misryoum. Inez describes art-making as something “in the blood. ” shaped by the creative presence of her matrilineal family and guided by the need to honor ancestors rather than carve out identity through conflict.. Her sculptures and prints braid myth with ecology. using forms that echo the human body and the spiritual worlds that humans build to survive.
What stands out is how she treats material as meaning. Clay is not only what she works with; it is also a metaphor for collective trauma and the possibility of transformation.
Inez’s process favors repetition and patience. whether she is rolling coils for a sculptural form or moving slowly through the stages of printmaking.. In her account, both mediums share a kind of alchemy, where the steps matter as much as the final image.. The studio becomes a ritual space: preparing materials. handling them by hand. and returning again and again to the same gestures that feel ancient and necessary.
Her upcoming work with Misryoum-ready audiences takes that ritual into the garden.. The show frames a direct relationship between individual vessels and specific plants tied to the transatlantic slave trade. including okra. Sudanese hibiscus. black-eyed peas. and Palestinian olives.. Inez explains that the vessel’s shape carries a recognizable language for viewers. one that invites them to see themselves. their gods. or their own histories inside the form.. In her view, the sculptures operate like votives, offerings to the spirits of the plants she researches.
This is where cultural memory becomes visible in a new way: the materials we consume and grow can also be evidence of what was stolen, carried forward, and re-grown.
The healing in Inez’s practice is not presented as a gentle abstraction.. She describes the research period as heavy. tangled with anger at patterns of erasure. and propelled by a turn toward community knowledge.. As she built the exhibition. she interviewed farmers. land stewards. and educators aligned with her values. landing on gardening as a form of resistance.. For Inez, tending the earth is an act of reliance, especially when violence continues to shape both land and lives.
That community-first approach extends beyond the studio walls.. Inez has spoken about working in an arts organization for adult artists with developmental disabilities. where creative making helped people process multiple crises.. The result, she says, is a practice that grows through relationships rather than solitude alone.. Her belief is simple and urgent: community feeds art practice, and art should return something in kind.
By connecting clay, soil, and inherited wisdom, Inez offers more than an aesthetic project. She shows how heritage can be practiced daily, through plants, attention, and communal care, making cultural identity feel not just remembered, but actively rebuilt.