I planned to explore the abundant plant life at the property by extracting pigments and dyes, and using them to create surface designs on fabric, starting with Turkish marbling. The colours I was able to get from foraged plants were surprisingly vivid and gave me the opportunity to work in a new palette of purples, pale greens and yellows. My residency culminated in the creation of a sketchbook called ‘The Yellow Body’ which explores ideas around cycles of life and fertility through the lens of plant biology, the Greek myth of Demeter, goddess of the harvest, and poetry. The term ‘yellow body’ refers to the saffron-coloured corpus luteum which develops in the ovaries after ovulation - and echoes the golden, fertilised fields in the autumn. Although my time at Xenia was limited to two weeks, the ideas that germinated while I was there continue to pollinate my work and mark a turning point in my practice.