For artist Wanda Gillespie, any item crafted by hand can become a sacred object. “In my opinion, an object hand-crafted with care and focused intention using natural materials like wood—a once living, breathing entity with deep time traces left through its rings—elevates its energetic qualities and makes it worthy of devotion,” she says.

Using the rounded form of the bead as her focus point, Gillespie creates wood sculptures that reflect on the intersection of value (both personal and monetary)and the sacred. Beads used in counting tools like the abacus and rosary prayer beads, are of special interest to Gillespie, and much of her new work was developed during a recent residency at the Victorian Woodworkers Association. “I became especially inspired by ornately carved rosary beads from the Netherlands and France. Some of these beads have human faces carved on them, sometimes saints, but more often as memento mori terminal beads for the rosary. At the same time, I’m also drawn to the simplicity of the unadorned rounded bead from prayer beads.”

In Of Counting and Devotion, which shows at Craft Victoria’s Vitrine Gallery, finely crafted wooden structures reminiscent of ancient artefacts and abaci feature beads of varied sizes, advancing their potential use beyond the mathematical to also include the measurement of nature and the spiritual. In larger work, delicate human figures partially emerge from gnarled slices of wood. Imperfections like the timber burl have become a characteristic Gillespie seeks out for the “expressive, softer sculptural form” this gives her work. Spalting in timber is also a new feature she has begun working with. “It’s a process where timber has grown fungus that leaves dark line markings. It has an interesting effect and highlights the sense of history and time in the timber that I’m so drawn to.”

Of Counting and Devotion
Wanda Gillespie
Craft Victoria
6 March—26 April

This article was originally published in the March/April 2025 print edition of Art Guide Australia.