Oi Oi Oi

You're invited...

...to The Australia Project. This is a really cool project organised by three designers, Chris Edser, Yianni Hill and Scott Heinrich and is being presented in Melbourne to coincide with the AGIdeas conference.

And guess what?

Yes, I was accepted to take part!

The exhibition opens on Wednesday night at c3 gallery at the Abbotsford convent. Please come along. Here's a preview of my brooches. They are named after the characters in Rikki Tikki Tavi by Rudyard Kipling.

Nag - sublimate printed steel, garnet beads, copper. About 15cm tall

Nagaina - reworked biscuit tin, sublimate printed steel, garnet beads, copper. About 15cm square.

Krait - sublimate printed steel, copper. About 25cm long.



Yes. They're big. And Yes. My photography is getting better!

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friday night

lookin' at blogs... watching the box... (enjoyed Whitechapel) feeling like I need to post again... Here's a few examples of what I sent to my exhibition at CAJ in Kyoto...

sorry for the bad photos, I've improved my technique since I took these...

all brooches

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Figment II

So the opening went orrrf!

I couldn't stay long as my folks were in town and we had a dinner booked at 7.

There are some photos of the opening over at Katherine Wheeler's blog. And here are the brooches that I have in the exhibition...

Jude - printed steel, copper, garnet beads

Edgar - printed steel, copper

Drago - printed steel, copper, garnet beads

Feargal - printed steel, copper

Kit - reworked biscuit tin, printed steel, copper, garnet beads

Shylock - printed steel, copper

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inspiration

Does anyone else remember this...?

I have such strong memories of this book. Particularly the story of the little thumbsucker.

Maybe it's because I sucked my thumb when I was little. Anyway, I drew on this book and the nightmares it inspired for the work I've produced for figment. Below is the little bit of writing I did for the floorsheet in the exhibition.

The Great Tall Tailor always comes,

To little boys that suck their thumbs.

He comes equipped, yes I'm afraid,

With scissors sharp as razor blades.

He'll cut your thumbs clean off and then,

You know, they never grow again.

Heinrich Hoffman

Of all the tales in Hoffmann’s Struwwelpeter, it is The Story of Little Suck-a-Thumb that permeated the nightmares of a young Anna Davern. In the story, The Great Tall Tailor does come. And the boy’s thumbs are snipped off with his razor sharp scissors. The  illustrations in Davern’s childhood copy of the book were graphic and explicit, the young boy’s hands spurt blood from where his thumbs once were. It is this gruesome memory that has inspired the creation of Davern’s range of brooches for Figment. The brooches evoke the unease of the closet door left ajar after lights out, the expanse of darkness underneath the bed and the unexplained footfalls outside the room.

And here's a tiny little sneak peak...

figment

I am in this exhibition.

Please come.
It's this Thursday night.
It doesn't list the artists on the invite but they are: Katherine Bowman, Michaela Bruton, me, Natalia Milosz-Piekarska, Jessica Morrison, Karla Way, and Katherine Wheeler.

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