I was lucky enough to go to Paris one year and see a Niki de Saint Phalle piece outside the Pompidou in Paris. Wow is the only word that springs to mind, I love her use of colour and just the scale that she worked on was truly amazing. Over the years I've been to many galleries and exhibitions but there was something about her work that just stays with you, just nibbles away at you and says 'I want to try that too'. Not only was this an exploration into sculpture for me - having never worked on either sculpture or scale before, but also an exploration of how I see myself. As for many women there are times when we either cannot or will not see ourselves as we truly are - and for some reason many of us only choose to see the negative. I would urge anyone to have a go at doing this, if only for the self realisation of seeing yourself as others do - which is usually as an amazing person, we just lose sight of that all too often.
This was the starting point - and as usual, there was no part of me that considered how on earth to achieve this or think about details, just a 'that's what I want to make'!
So, with that in mind I went off in search of: chicken wire, newspaper, modroc, paint, heavy tape
And this is what happened! My parents visited at one point and saw the chaos of the dining room and just went 'oh, what you doing this time?' luckily they are now used to the randomness that occurs around here and just move a space to put their tea down safely.
Phase 1: create a chicken wire outline - this was done by wrapping me in chicken wire and carefully rolling out from underneath it!
Phase 2: wrap in papier mache to create the body
Phase 3: mod roc!! every house should own tons of this stuff, it's great!
Phase 5: place on top of shed so she looks like she's sunbathing in all her glory! sit back and enjoy :)
Do try this at home - it's such a fantastic exercise in what if? and it makes you smile every time you look, and the neighbours' reactions are priceless!
