Living Costumes
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Over the last 7 years I have been creating and developing a series of part-sculpture part-performance based work called living costumes and grass men. Using a technique I have developed I create wearable living art that takes 2 months to grow and then once constructed forms a full seamless costume that continues to live.
I'm fascinated by this relationship between making something that can live but also be worn, manipulated and used in a performance the plays with this relationship we have with nature. These performance have taken part across the UK usually at art festivals or other social events. I have always been humbled by the feedback and public interaction the works receives. It becomes more than just a performance, people become apart of a surreal experience where they get to hug nature and it hugs them back. From kids barely able to walk to 90 year old women chasing it down to give it a stroke, the work seems to bring out a unusual but joyful experience that seems to become one of the most important elements of the work
This summer I receive a commission and funding to take and develop the work at Bernhiem Research forest and aboratorium in the USA. There I experiemented in a new climate and worked and performed with new people and the response was the same.