Always on
This project successfully funded on 24th July 2026, you can still support them with a donation.
The Boudica Rising Pilgrimage July 1-12!
Colchester, Essex, United Kingdom
Aim
A 70+ mile solo trek from Norwich to Colchester. Following Boudica's path, a sensory research project for an upcoming Fringe show and PhD.
About Me & The Vision
I am a neurodivergent artist and researcher who crossed an ocean only to find a 2,000-year-old queen waiting for me in Colchester. My work is a form of sensory archaeology. I don't just read history—I engage with it through my synesthetic senses, creating "tactile historiographies" like my Boudica Rising Oracle Deck. My vision is to forge a new, embodied way of knowing the past that centres neurodivergent and Indigenous ways of being, challenging the impersonal, colonial narratives that dominate our history books.
Last year, I premiered a raw 10-minute monologue at the Colchester Fringe. It was the spark. This October, that spark becomes a full 50-minute solo show—an explosive synthesis of personal story, historical fury, and the findings from the trek you are helping to fund.
And now, a new flame has caught: I have just learned that my application to perform at the Colchester Fringe weekend at the end of July has been accepted. That means, before the October show, I will bring a fresh, work-in-progress excerpt from this pilgrimage to the very city where Boudica burned the temple. It is a chance to test the raw material—the sensory field notes, the linocuts, the heat still under my boots—in front of a live audience, mid-journey. The trek feeds the Fringe; the Fringe feeds the final October show.
The Idea: A 70-Mile Sensory Pilgrimage
This July, I will walk 70+ miles solo from Norwich to Colchester, retracing the Roman Pye Road—the very route Boudica and her army took. This is not a hike; it is the primary fieldwork for my practice-led PhD. It is a pilgrimage of deep listening. Using my neurodivergent cognition as my primary tool, I will document the journey through linocut sketches, sound recordings, soil samples, and meditative field notes. This collected sensory data will become the core of my expanded Fringe show and the foundational research for my doctoral work.
My Team
Though the majority of the trek will be a solo effort, I will be joined for segments by members of my team. This project is bolstered by a vital circle of support:
My Producer/Director: The visionary helping me shape the trek's events and the 50-minute Fringe show into a powerful, cohesive experience.
Ch-Alice Gallery: My artistic home not far from Colchester, which will benefit directly from a portion of the funds as it transitions into a charity.
You: By backing this project, you become the essential partner who makes this rigorous, unconventional research possible.
How Your Support Will Be Used
Every pound has a direct, purposeful role in realizing this vision. The funds will be allocated across the following key pillars:
Community & Legacy Support (£1,500): A direct donation to the Ch-Alice Gallery to support their vital work as they become a charity, ensuring a thriving space for artists.
The Artist's Foundation : Allows me to dedicate the necessary time and focus to this intense period of fieldwork, PhD commencement, and creative development. This covers key living and research costs, ensuring the work is sustainable and done with integrity.
The Trek & Research
£1300
Essential equipment (walking gear, camping, safety), accommodation along the route, travel logistics, and documentation supplies. The investment in gathering primary sensory data.
Artistic Creation & Production
£1200
Development of the Fringe show, including set design, AV integration for documentary footage, materials for new linocut artworks, and production costs.
The Artist's Foundation
£1200
Living costs during this intense period of fieldwork and creative development. This is what allows me to dedicate the necessary time and focus to do the work justice.
Your pledge is an investment in a radical artistic and academic journey. You're not just funding a walk; you're helping to build a new methodology for history itself, one rooted in the wisdom of the body, the land, and a neurodivergent mind. Thank you for being part of this rebellion.
The Creation of the Boudica Rising Oracle Deck
The Boudica Rising Oracle Deck was not designed at a desk. It was excavated.
Each of its 13 potent cards was forged from a direct, sensory conversation with the landscape of rebellion. I went to the source—the layer of ash beneath the High Street, the stones of the Balkerne Gate, the sacred flow of the River Colne—and listened. My neurodivergent, synesthetic perception translated the feeling of these places: the sting of injustice, the heat of defiance, the weight of sacred ground.
These impressions were carved, in reverse, into linoleum. The physical act of carving became a ritual—each deliberate gouge and curve echoing the themes of rupture, resilience, and reclamation. I then hand-printed each block, making every deck a unique artifact, where slight variations in ink and pressure remind us that history, like memory, is felt, not fixed.
This compact, powerful deck is a tactile historiography. It distills a vast story of trauma and power into 13 essential visions, offering not answers, but a profound tool for embodied dialogue. It is the first complete testament to my sensory archaeological method, a method this pilgrimage will now expand across seventy miles.
Even the packaging is hand printed
The decks are then surrounded by sacred soil gathered from the bank of the River Colne, as a blessing, before being sent out into the world.
Ch-Alice Welcomes Boudica Rising
The journey of this work found its perfect home thanks to the visionary artist and owner of Ch-Alice, Antonia Layzell. Recognizing the deep, spiritual resonance and raw power in my Boudica-inspired creations, Antonia reached out with a profound invitation: to bring my oracle decks and artworks into her unique gallery and holistic healing space at 11 Gainsborough Street in Sudbury. This sanctuary has become the vibrant heart of the project. It is where I conduct intimate 1-to-1 readings with the deck, facilitating personal dialogues with its themes of strength and sovereignty. Furthermore, within this inspiring space, I collaborated with gifted aromatherapist Natalie Garden to create the project's signature, unisex Boudica Rising fragrance, using essential oils from plants native to Norfolk and Suffolk’s landscape. Antonia’s belief has provided more than a platform—it has fostered a truly aligned creative and spiritual home for this ongoing rebellion.
Funding method
Keep what you raise – this project will receive all pledges made