Emily Joy Interview

This short conversation between artist Emily Joy and curator Beulah Ezeugo was recorded shortly after Emily’s work finally arrived in Galway. Emily talks about her practice with clay, soil and water, and reflects on the irony that her ceramic salmon sculptures – works about migration, rivers and crossing borders – were themselves stopped at customs as “hazardous” and delayed until the final week of the festival. Together they unpack what this says about borders, Brexit, movement, and who or what is allowed to travel, while also touching on the wider Borderlands / Y Gororau collaboration with Mair Hughes and writer Durre Shahwar, and how the project has reshaped Emily’s relationship to Welsh identity.