Avona.

Avona is a collaboration between activists, artist and the local community. She is a large scale puppet that represents the goddess of the river Avon, our local river in Bristol. She was made in a series of community workshops and has attended a number of river ceremonies, raising awareness about the quality of the water and the rights that rivers have. 

A collaboration with nature activists

Rave on for the Avon

and Mrs Meg Avon.

Within the design process I had to think about how this could be a collaborative project within the community but also have a consistent style and character. It was important to allow people to bring their own ideas and passions to the project, and together we created the idea of who Avona was for us. Facilitating this in a series of drop in workshops was a challenge but a very rewarding process. The fact that she was build by many hands was a big part of the project. Bringing community together for a creative and meaningful purpose.

Avona’s first outing when we paraded her from St Annes house to the river for a birthing ceremony. We had many people singing and joining us along the way.

Photos by Charlotte Sawyer

We experimented with puppeteering her with free divers. This was a really interesting way of working and brought an interesting element and story to this project.