Sculpture

Ceramics.  The Rhinos of Venice.
Kathryn Moores 2013

 The Byronoceros.  

Kathryn Moores 2013

Ceramic and oxide.

39cm length.

Lord Byron swims the Venetian Grand Canal as Clara the Rhino.

 

 Moulded hollow clay balls to assemble into stylised rhinos.

 The assembled balls with added details.

 The second set of stylised rhinos.

 The winged rhino representing Venice's patron saint, St. Mark, whose emblem is the winged lion.

 

 Brightly coloured glazed stylised rhinos.

 Sculpted wet clay rhino, modelled on Clara, the pet rhino of Venice, thought to be the first in Europe.

 Greenware rhino, showing  scale against the artist.

 After bisque firing, the application of oxides and carbonates provides the range of colours and highlight the textures.

 A covering of transparent glaze before the second firing disguises the colours of the oxides and carbonates.

 

 The finished work.

 A rhino sculpted in wet clay, again representing the Venetian rhino Clara.  The addition of wings is in reference to St. Mark, the patron saint of Venice, whose symbol is the winged lion, seen all over Venice.

 Inside the Raku kiln

 Raku firing technique for a metallic reduction of a Fume coating on the sculpted St. Mark's rhino.

 Close up detail of the cooled Raku St. Mark's rhino.

 A 'half' rhino, sculpted in wet clay.  The top half is visible as the rhino is sculpted as being semi-submerged, reminiscent of the occasion when the poet Byron, a famous Venetian resident for some time, swam in the Grand Canal. Clara was often bathed in the Grand Canal.

 This sculpture only underwent one firing with the application of copper carbonate and manganese dioxide.

Front view of 'half' rhino.

 A wet clay rhino rib cage over a hump mould.

Failed firing!
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Sculpture

 Angel. 2013. 165cm. Glass, copper, brass, aluminium, plastic, paint and chicken bones.

Angel by Kathryn Moores 2013. Glass, copper, brass, aluminium, plastic, paint and chicken bones.

An assemblage of discreet pieces creating an entity reminiscent of a biology specimen from a Victorian collection.  The anatomical influences make it at once recognisable as a rib cage, but the additional features, such as the moulded glass candlestick which acts as a stand, represent a clashing of eras and therefore timelessness.
The robot-like structure, referencing the early 1980's mechanical sculptures by the likes of Oppenheim, attempts to suggest a clashing as well as harmonious composition.
The chicken rib 'heart' invites the viewer to step forward and engage with the piece and is the only organic piece in a work which suggests the human form, if somewhat distorted.
The metal sternum invokes craftsmanship whilst the plastic foam ribs show modernity and disposability.

Inside the rib cage, suspended on brass plated wire is the red painted rib cage of a chicken in place of the heart.

Moulded glass candlestick base on magnifying mirror. 

Sculpture


Going from a premise whereby an object which has 'meaning' to an individual can inspire a sculpture. 

Keys became a recurring theme with many individuals.  Some, who had recently left home, saw keys as liberation. Others saw keys as a way to let themselves in to a place of sanctuary, or as a means to travel (car keys).  After a spell of drawing keys with keyings attached, I was reminded of how a pair of keys could look like a pair of legs and my Key Angel was produced.  This had some similarities to the work of the artist Claire Murray Adams.  Especially as I developed a strong rib cage on my sculpture.

Claire Murray Adams

The materials available to use would only be partially limited by those being available at the studio or easily obtained with respect to the four week deadline for exhibition.

My first Key Angel, made from cardboard, plastic carrier bags, tape and polystyrene.  This shows the keys as legs and the strong rib cage form.

Key Angel (35cm height)

Cardboard, polystyrene, cellotape and plastic bags.

Kathryn Moores 2013

The symmetry and the anatomical look of the above sculpture is somewhat reminiscent of the work of Cathy DE Monchaux (Britain 1960), being wall mounted and intricate but bordering on the grotesque.  It does lack the sexuality of her work although I strongly identify with her fascination with Saintly Relics, something I explored whilst visiting the Basillica of Saint Mark in Venice.

Various Saintly relics (or arm bones) including Saint George from the Treasury of Saint Mark's, Venice.  Kathryn Moores 2013.

I was further inspired by the work of Petra Feriancova (Slovakia 1977) whose work, the series, Intrigues of the Gods are Behind Everything.

These pieces, displayed at Frieze 2013, seemed to united my fascination with the anatomical, the gruesome and the otherworldly (cf religious relics), especially The Cave  (installation plaster casts of elephant tusks) 2013

The materials I selected to begin working with were clay, metal, insulation foam and cable ties.

Knowing that a cage form, rather than Feriancova's 'Cave' in which the rib/tooth like projections were more similar to stalagmites or other natural phenomena, I found the suggestion of a cage being created out of human parts, using ribs and bones (strong and yet delicate) more striking and connected to my fascination with religious ideology.  The contents of the cage could therefore be more varied and a juxtaposition to the biological form I would imitate.

First the construction of the spine.

One variation was the use of clay and the other using a length of pipe insulation foam, divided by cable ties which had a strangely orthopedic appearance, especially with the excess lengths left in place, which suggested ribs before any further work had been undertaken.  

The next construction challenge was the addition of ribs.  Using clay, a plan of a rib cage was drawn out, and cut out, before being placed around an inflated support whilst it dried.

From this point, I began to see a delicacy in the work I was producing, having looked at the fragility of actual skeletons.  I found myself considering adding details of corsetry to the form and also the idea of incorporating fragile taxidermy into the piece.

The Fish

 

Glass ribs, glimpsed through crate handles, are seen in this sculpture by David Nuur

The fragility of the structure of a ribcage (or the internal structure of any soft-bodied creature) whilst regular and predictable, is fundamentally brittle and delicate and beautiful.

The ongoing rib cage sculpture...

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Paper Sculpture

Using nothing but cheap white paper, glue, a pair of scissors and some tearing fingers....

Feathers 2013

Kathryn Moores

Paper

21cm x 29cm

Quills 2013

Kathryn Moores

Paper

21cm x 29 cm

Infinity 2013

Kathryn Moores

Paper

10 cm x 8cm x 6cm

Shack 2013

Kathryn Moores

Paper

13cm x 6cm x 6cm

construction pieces for a build

Strips of paper ready to be rolled into construction pieces

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 Hesse Burlesque.

Inspired by the early '3D drawings' of Eva Hesse (1936 - 1970) .

Hesse and her husband Tom Doyle set up their studio in a disused textile mill in New York where remnants from the building's previous incarnation were strewn all about the place.  Hesse was inspired to create drawings by the mechanical debris but she also made relief sculptures from the small pieces of detritus (textiles, threads etc.) which littered the floor.

As a lot of Hesse's work is sexual on some level, the coiled string readily suggestive of breasts, led me to add the projecting bunches of string and a new reaction to Hesse's work appealed to me, that of combining it with the fashion for burlesque and of subduing the usually glitzy costumes, such as the nipple tassels, by using unbleached string.

Hesse Burlesque

Kathryn Moores 2013

Relief sculpture

Unbleached string on paper

26cm x20cm