Daphne Wright

Daphne Wright makes the most extraordinary delicate sculptures. Her work reminds me of both Beth Cavener Stitcher and Kate McDowell's pieces. These are not ceramic however, they are a combination of marble dust and resin. Some pieces include silk embroidery thread and paint. I am particularly interested in the death masks she created from the corpses of animals. The pieces are beautiful and eerie and exist in that space where beauty and tragedy co-exist. 

I suppose what really draws me to a lot of work is that very thing: the juxtaposition of two seemingly opposite ideas grappling for superiority the same space. Is the subject matter more overpowering than the beauty of the execution and rendering? For some people it will always be so and then I think it will be impossible for them to see the beauty of the object, in this case the body of a dead animal.

Daphne Wright's work is simultaneously an homage and a criticism. It is poetic and damning and beautiful and horrifying all at the same time. I absolutely love that you can feel the weight and flaccidity of the hanging lamb, fox and piglet despite them being cast in marble dust. 

Unfortunately there is no artist website to link to though she is represented by Frith Street Gallery in London.

 

 

 

Heather Benning, firestarter.

I found out about Heather Benning's Doll House project only after she set fire to it. I stumbled across the CBC story quite by accident but I am glad I did. Unfortunately I didn't get a chance to see the project in real life though there are a number of You Tube videos documenting it. The initial project converted an old farm house into a life sized version of a doll house. The house was open to view through plexiglass on one side and filled with ephemera from the 1960s. If you happened across it in the middle of the prairie it might appear as if the occupants had perhaps fled from it. The house stayed exactly as Benning (re)created it for nearly six years.

I am unsure why it was burned down instead of torn down though I do really like the idea of fire erasing it from the landscape. It seems to me to be a more authentic and natural form of erasure than tearing it down or letting it be destroyed by vandals. It is interesting too that fire isn't necessarily something one associates with a doll house so to set fire to a representation of childhood seems to also imply something a bit dark. I like that.  

If you have been following this blog for a while then you know how much I love narative projects. Whether the narrative is implicit or implied I love being able to imagine countless scenarios for a particular piece of work. I suppose this work allows me to imagine two separate bnarratives; the house as a museum on the prairie and the motivation and spectacle of a house fire.

I love imagining the people who may have lived there; What did they do? What celebrations and tragedies did they experience during their time in the house? Where did they come from? Where did they go? What sorts of secrets are hidden in the walls?

The Dollhouse is like a three dimensional memory. It makes me think of a half remembered dream you could re-visit over and over but access to specific and tactile information is denied by the plexiglass – much like one feels days after an intense dream. The Dollhouse project was also really interesting for me because I grew up on the prairies. My grandparents house was a lot like a museum; there were many artifacts kept alive within the walls of that prairie house. Pioneer spirits seemed to be content to lie quietly inside closets and in boxes tucked away under beds and and in basements.

Heather Benning captured perfectly the prairie life and preserved it for passersby and pilgrims who traveled out of the city to recollect a piece of Canada's past. Her new work continues to explore memory, landscape and the idea of home. You can see more of her work on her website heatherbenning.ca

Goody-B Wiseman

It's been awhile since I've had the luxury of snooping the corners of the internet for inspiring artists. I stumbled across this amazing and wonderful artist named Goody-B Wiseman who reminds me of a Yukon artist I will post about a bit later. Her small scale bronze sculptures are awesome and I really really hope that she is making more of them right now!

I discovered that Wiseman attended NSCAD for her undergraduate degree before moving to San Fransisco to complete her MFA. I could not determine whether she is Canadian or American, not that it really matters, but it is interesting for me to track themes I am interested in across Canadian artists. She now lives in Maine and is working at raising a baby and building a home with her partner. And yes they are doing everything themselves.

Goody-B Wiseman makes tiny bronze sculptures of children dressed as animals. That isn't ALL she does, she also makes works on paper and films but these little pieces have captured my imagination. The photos unfortunately are crap. Here's hoping that with the 30 or 40% take the gallery has they will invest in a competent photographer to do justice to their artists' work. (ok short rant over).

I scoured the internet looking for more information about Goody-B but couldn't come up with very much that was recent or interesting aside from this little excerpt from an interview with Akimbo:

3. Old People & Animals

I like old people and animals more than other people and other things. They are wonderful, they are true, and they have excellent stories.

Old people are, in general, in a better position to be good people and they are good people much more often then younger people are. They’ve lived longer lives and have had time to practice patience, empathy, observation, kindness, and generosity. Old people have more and often better and longer stories. Stories are essential, keepers of stories are precious, and patient and generous keepers of better and longer and truer stories are my favourite.

Animals are, in general, in a good position to be better than people. They don’t lie or cheat. They do steal, but I don’t mind. Animals activate some ancient nature-magic for me and connect me to mythology. I prefer anything that involves animals, especially stories.

After reading this am interested to know why the pieces are made with what appear to be child figures when she obviously has such an affection for the elderly. I wonder what the pieces would be like if the animators under the masks/costumes were old people instead of young people.

I find Wiseman's work and approach to life fascinating and I love the implicit narrative at work in her pieces. I love that they work together or as individuals and the story can change depending on which pieces are together or isolated. I also love that they fit in the palm of your hand and have weight. It is like when I was a kid and had some comfort carrying around a secret idol in my pocket that held a story only I could tell.

You can see more of her work at the Gallery Page and Strange  or try to see the art via really shitty photos at Katharine Mulherin.

Marc Seguin

Canadian artist Marc Seguin's 2007 series titled Roadkill is simultaneously terrifying and beautiful. It is difficult both in it's subject matter and its interpretation. Seguin's work is perhaps not so much about academic interpretation as it is about giving you a stiff punch in the gut. It is disturbing, unsettling, haunting and at the same time beautiful, sad, even wishful. Seguin's work is dark, and the narrative is not always clear but without question the works are powerfully evocative. Like it or not, there is no denying Marc Seguin's work is powerful.

Have a look at his website to see more of his work past and present.

Diana Thorneycroft

Diana Thorneycroft is a Canadian artist who re-imagines and creates dioramas of Canadian history. I love her work as it is not only brilliant in its conception but is also simultaneously hilarious and heartbreaking. Her work is like laughing as the love of your life stabs you to death.

Her series The Group of Seven Awkward Moments are little gems of wit and Canadian culture each staged in front of a different Group of Seven Painting. She describes her work as follows:

It is through the use of the collective's iconic northern landscapes, which have come to symbolize Canada as a nation, combined with scenes of accidents, disasters, and bad weather that gives the work its edge. By pairing the tranquility of traditional landscape painting with black humour, the work conjures up topical and universally familiar landscapes fraught with anxiety and contradictions.

Her series that follwed The awkward moments was much darker and effectively opens the skeletal closet of the Canadian collective consciousness. The content for A People's History relates directly to a current or historical event and exposes the dark evils that lurk at the periphery of our history books. I may have been much more interested in learning history while in school if discussions about the issues found in Thorneycroft's work were introduced and even more interested if we'd udes her work to initiate discussion. While it is fine to read about the "facts" as we all know history is written by the victor and therefore many stories go unrecorded. She describes the ongoing series:

With some of the research however, it became apparent the word “awkward” was not applicable. The horrors that took place in First Nations residential schools and orphanages like Mount St. Cashel, Newfoundland, speak of atrocities that eradicate all humour. 

I am in the process of completing the “atrocities” and working towards an exhibition entitled “A People’s History”. The series is about horrific events committed in Canada against our most vulnerable citizens; the disadvantaged, the uneducated and the young. At the time of each violation the victims were either ignored, disbelieved, or considered expendable.

Thorneycroft's work is an interesting form of documentary, capturing imagined events with dolls as if recreating the events for a therapist. Perhaps her work is a therapeutic form in which we all can participate as each of these events leaves an indelible impression on us as Canadians and how we see ourselves.

Janice Wright Cheney

 

If you have only recently discovered this little gem of a blog then you may not know the affinity I have for coyotes and taxidermy. Any time I see an artist using coyotes or coyote forms or any taxidermy "ephemera" really, I sometimes develop a little art crush. I usually end up spending a couple hours exploring an artists website and making notes and then in most cases, they end up posted here. and again, I have stumbled or linked my way to the amazing and incredible Janice Wright Cheney. 

I think I have mentioned my affinity for coyotes and animals and taxidermy. Janet's work is interesting because while her wolves/coyotes sometimes look more like weimaraners than wild animals I think it is intentional because her work blurs the lines between wild and domestic, as well as gender.Much of Janet's work involves combining a traditionally female craft (embroidery, tatting, knitting) with a form that suggests masculinity: the taxidermy form. The foam "carcass" is dressed up in "female" attire complete with jewellry and false eyelashes. The wild animals seem far more domestic in their lacy scarves and fur which appears more of a fashion statement than as a representation of them in thier "natural" state.

It is interesting too that the ladies (which is a total assumption since we can't see all of their anatomy) are only half dressed either half skinned or half covered depending and when juxtaposed with the bones of the actual animals in small boxes much like museum specimens the question really does become about what remains. Placing these creatures out in a natural environment makes the question even more haunting.

The felted flower covered bears are titled Widow and represent loss, grief and survival. A taxidermied bear is often posed in an aggressive stance speaking with some suggestion tot he prowess of the hunter who killed it. I have never seen a bear trophy mounted to depict a bear lost in thought or simply sitting and admiring its surroundings. These bears simultaneously represent the trophy, the monument, the conquer and yet something more delicate- a sadness, a memorial, a burial ritual. The flower covering the bears is a rose, hundreds of hand felted red, pink, and burgundy roses the flower of love. Generally the red rose is  symbol of romantic love and the title hints at this loss as well "widow" suggesting the loss of a husband. What fascinates me even more is that bears do not mate for life – they do not marry, they do not have the matrimonial bond of humans nor do they even co-habitate yet there is no questioning the love and bond between a bear and her cubs. And that leaves me wondering if there is a subtext at play that perhaps the bear has suffered a loss and is more than simply a momunment to the fear and conquer human trophy.