The Ministry of Small Truths:
A dialogue of artifacts
The Ministry of Small Truths is a department within Science & Magic which archives the small, overlooked, profoundly true moments that comprise a life.
The following works were made in collaboaration with Eimear Kavanagh and Toria Garbutt:
Case File #001:
Report on interacting with fruit in an autumnal morning hinita on a wooden floor in Halifax. Observation of a moment of time in which the ordinary and every day turns extraordinarily luminous.
*(Hinata: a spot exposed to sunlight)
Sit in it
Put your apple under the spotlight
Watch it turn to glass before your VERY EYES
Examine it very quietly and closely
Listen
Kiss it
Lick it like a sugar dummy at the seaside
Dip it in chocolate and sprinkles
Put it to your ear after you bite
Hear it crackle forever
Feel the inside of your cheeks bleed
Read its veins
A haiku in a fortune teller’s teacup
Hold a banana to your ear
Tadaaaa
a cordless phone
Talk to your sister
Tell her you've missed her
The delicious gold of October
Cast a beastly shadow with your hands on the wooden floor
A huff and puff woolf knock knock knocks at the door
Squint one eye to block the light
Hold the skeleton of a promenade parasol in your spindly fingers if you’re so inclined
Feel both worlds exist at the exact same
Words by Toria Garbutt
Artwork by Eimear Kavanagh
Case File #002:
Report on the interaction between smoke from a match stick and a shaft of light through a living room window in Halifax on a winter morning.
A Floating Cauldron
Rotates mid air
An astonishing hologram
You can
Walk through or around it
Dare to dip your hand in
Wear it like a lace glove
An Intricate trickster
A wispy disc
A thin pool of magic
Exists
Dance in it
Wear it like a shawl
Wear it like a stole
Wear it like a shrug
Exquisite
Leave your scent in its silky lining
Your fingerprints in utero
Your molluscs in a shell
A blueprint for a secret code
Look closely
Read the lines on her face
The crumples on his pillow
The indentations on his desk
Blow it like steam from a teacup
And watch it disappear
Words by Toria Garbutt
Artwork by Eimear Kavanagh
All This Time And I Didn’t Know
An impulsive response to sound
“Eimear made me cry for a full 5 minutes with this responsive painting.
It’s the first thing I’d fetch if the house was burning”
Rachael Jean Harris
All This Time And I Didn’t Know
Abstract art created in real time - alongside sound & spoken word audio composed by Rachael Jean Harris.
Movement and flow in mark-making to the rhythm of sound. Like a dance, in the moment the painting almost paints itself and takes on a life of it’s own.
You are invited to listen to the accompanying sound clip below.
Listen to the sound clip below:
Artwork by Eimear Kavanagh
As featured in..
The Death Issue - Autumn 2025
‘Tree of Souls’ Artwork by Eimear Kavanagh
Plot K23
Crossing the threshold, I engage in silence
This is a portal place for the living
With eyes I listen, sensing the passing of time
An appreciation of Life.
For The Guardian,
A gift of Black Onyx and copper coin
Seeking permission and extending thanks
That’s what it says to do in the books,
And The Guardian liked it.
Following my sense of wonder
Immersed in nineteenth century charm
Decaying gravestones, overgrown shrubs
I look for dates and clues
Reminded of fragility, bitten by mortality.
An ancient Majestic Tree
Invites me to shade from the sun
As the Blackbirds dance and sing,
I am led to the enormous scaly bark
To hear The Gravestone aside:
JOHN WILSON, 1893 AGED 79
JANE wife, 1883 AGED 73
THOMAS son, 1881 AGED 39
JAMES son, 1869 AGED 18
JOHN son, 1857 AGED 11
ANN daughter, 1852 AGED 3 MONTHS
JANE daughter, 1919 AGED 69
Tragedy has me looking for beauty
What lies beneath this Tree?
How far do the roots span out?
What becomes of the remains beneath?
Because the grave lies under, within and above
As entangled inside The Tree, as my own thoughts.
Looking up, a dense canopy of green
Thick with layers, I see trees within trees
Branches snaking branches, like clinging limbs
As if still holding on in the After Life
The goose bumps me, chilling the surface of my skin
I stand before a living memorial
Dead, ancient, alive and thriving.
Unable to make sense
So much is clear, yet so much is not.
How did I get here?
I know I am already in too deep
And sometimes things, they don’t need answers
Better to be shrouded in the mystery
And sometimes, That’s the way it was meant to be.
A departing gift,
A rose for the grave
A white one.
Because that's what it says in the books,
And they liked it
At Plot K23.
Poem by Eimear Kavanagh