When I set out this brief I wanted to see how my relationship with my Chimera would develop as I created it. I found that as I was slowly making piece by piece putting it in the oven and baking it and waiting, I didn’t have much attachment I just needed to get this done for the deadline today. I wanted to put it in the ground and take photos of it and maybe document it decomposing and show more of the cyclic nature of the materials that I am working with. But by the end of assembling all the labour and love made me feel attached and I wanted to keep it with me for a wee while to admire it, I am really proud how it turned out.
That night I ended up taking all my compost out to the valley and documented the mound I created. I added liquid yogurt on-top and there was also rice so it looked kind of like a snowy mountain. I know that slowly this food will rot and then break down feeding the earth, insects and rats? I still wanted to give something to the ground and create a site relationship. I usually take my compost here but what was different this time was that I also brought a camera to document my mound. This valley is very interesting a has a big sign saying NO DUMPING but I feel like it’s all biodegradable and helping the earth so it’s all-good (but it was a little scary).
I took the photos with a long exposure to allow the camera to get in all the light. They came out quite blurry but I like it like that.
I find it interesting how the relationships I was exploring weren’t just that of me making my chimera and developing a relationship with it but also what I have in my house that can feed the earth and how I can use these mundane activities to create art through compost.
The use of compost makes me think a lot about Dieter Roth and his methods of making art to decompose. In the last painting brief I added a whole bunch of time tams roasted food just everything from the fridge and cupboard that needed to go on a tray and set it in the bathroom for about a month now and it only just started getting mouldy. I took it out with the compost as It was time to say good bye.
I like that these things grow and are created but over time they wither and start to decompose to be returned to the ground. Everything I used in my chimera came from the earth and will go back to it. I enjoyed using the dead dough and baking it- It really makes me feel like I’m tapping into my domestic goddess. Dead dough has been around for thousands of years and was a popular sculpting medium in Egypt. Because we are in lock down this practice has been easy to recreate because it’s simple and you dont need much more than whats in your kitchen.
I used thorns for the teeth that I collected when I was out nannying. The cabbage was at the back of the fridge just withering and waiting for me to use it for dye.
I know that its not super “realistic” like mesh mixer or like Patricia Piccini. It is a form that has been put together like building blokes not so much fused. But I feel like this gives me freedom to recreate this Chimera as something else. When creating a Chimera I find it hard not to get attached as it is an animal and it is made by me. In Dantes Inferno Virgil talks about how art is the grand child of creation which makes sense, especially when I am making this hybrid creature.