DREAM OR NIGHTMARE?
2020
Cast driftwood and objects in jesmonite, bandages.
50x 50 cm
DREAM OR NIGHTMARE?
2020
Dream or Nightmare? Cast driftwood and objects in jesmonite, bandages. 50cm x50cm
This series of work was based on driftwood collected from a beach, before lockdown. Driftwood is symbolic of feeling beached and stranded. Driftwood like a virus returns in waves.
Bones are often used in the artist's work. They reflect human vulnerability and our mortality both particularly poignant during the current pandemic. Bones and driftwood share a commonality, they are both vestigial remains.
Objects are combined that metaphorically relate to the COVID-19 pandemic, both personally but also from a wider perspective. The contextual links when re-assembled reveal a hidden narrative.The sculptures are bound by bandages into a COVID 19 formation. The doll-like faces represent feeling depersonalised by the experience of isolation, and the lack of agency of being told to stay inside and feeling puppet-like. Hands and arms represent hand washing and the inability to embrace. Bats, the vector of Covid19 invade the sculptures.
Dream or nightmare ?
Questions identity, both of the artist and sculpture.
The work explores the mixed identity as both observer and participant, as medical practitioner and patient living in social isolation. The work is highly personal, just as the artist has had to rebuild herself piece by piece so the Sculpture has evolved by using repeated metaphorical objects that relate to be pandemic. Human femurs and driftwood, both the vestigial remains are rendered to look like bone -is it bone or is it driftwood? The work is bound by bandages a reference to the artist's medical past as a healer and mixed identity as a patient. Dressings (bandages) by referencing Florence Nightingale acknowledge the key workers who provided medical aid and hope through healing for a post-pandemic world. The work also has mixed identity, although deliberately decorative it reveals the darker aspects of the pandemic, creating dissonance. The sum becomes something like a surreal optical puzzle, oscillating between dream and nightmare.
Above, maquette of Dream or Nightmare ?
Below construction of Dream or Nightmare ?
This series of work was based on driftwood collected from a beach, before lockdown. Driftwood is symbolic of feeling beached and stranded. Driftwood like a virus returns in waves.
Bones are often used in the artist's work. They reflect human vulnerability and our mortality both particularly poignant during the current pandemic. Bones and driftwood share a commonality, they are both vestigial remains.
Objects are combined that metaphorically relate to the COVID-19 pandemic, both personally but also from a wider perspective. The contextual links when re-assembled reveal a hidden narrative.The sculptures are bound by bandages into a COVID 19 formation. The doll-like faces represent feeling depersonalised by the experience of isolation, and the lack of agency of being told to stay inside and feeling puppet-like. Hands and arms represent hand washing and the inability to embrace. Bats, the vector of Covid19 invade the sculptures.
Dream or Nightmare?
Questions identity, both of the artist and sculpture.
The work explores the mixed identity as both observer and participant, as medical practitioner and patient living in social isolation. The work is highly personal, just as the artist has had to rebuild herself piece by piece so the sculpture has evolved by using repeated metaphorical objects that relate to the pandemic. Human femurs and driftwood, both vestigial remains are rendered to look like bone – is it bone or is it driftwood? The work is bound by bandages a reference to the artists medical past as a healer and mixed identity as a patient. Dressings (bandages) by referencing Florence Nightingale acknowledge the key workers who provided medical aid and hope through healing for a post pandemic world. The work also has a mixed identity, although deliberately decorative it reveals the darker aspects of the pandemic, creating dissonance. The sum becomes something like a surreal optical puzzle, oscillating between dream and nightmare.
Maquette of Dream or Nightmare?
Construction of Dream or Nightmare ?
Cast driftwood that has had objects added then new moulds made to reproduce the different pieces.
Below, cast arms to add to the bandages.
Cast driftwood that has had objects added then new moulds made to reproduce the different pieces.
Cast arms to add to the bandages.