16.10.20 - Stitching, Wire, Insect Art in the Home

I finished stitching the beetle together and stuffed it using scraps of fabric. Compared to normal stuffing, using fabric gives the creature more weight so it becomes quite floppy which I really like.

                                 

After using wire to suspend my clay figures, I was inspired to use it to make a beetle, and I found it quite difficult because the wire wasn't really strong enough to make a defined framework to wrap more wire around, so the shape looks botched. On the other hand, it reminds me of drawing using scribbles which I always enjoy doing, and when held up to the light, the silhouette looks like a flat line drawing. Another good thing is that it's very bendy so it can be posed and hold onto things, like in this picture I attached it to the side of my locker, giving the impression that it is climbing around, so it's quite animated in that sense.

This ornamental piece that I have at home relates really closely to my work since I have used wire, beads and suspension across various experiments, and this embodies all of them. The wire is thick and would need pliers or other tools to bend. I really love the way the light shines through the beads and I would like to try something like this myself.

This is another example I have at home of beads being used to depict an insect. I think they work really well because they have reflective, multi-tonal qualities just like real insects do, and beads are associated with jewellery and embellishment so they establish a higher status than what we might normally give to insects. This makes me think that using beads or other shiny materials would be a great way to make insects a 'comfortable' subject, which is something I'm focusing on at the moment.