... and I settled on toys, specifically teddy bears. I gave dolls a try during the developmental stages and they just looked a bit too much like the scary dolls out of those Chucky films - not the sort of vision I had in mind! Bears struck a chord with me... they
had a sense of the innocence of a child. Their faces perma-frozen in a state of cute bewilderment. The fluffiness of them added to their cuteness and gave them a sense of fragility and softness. They were ideal vessels to represent my daughter. I had ben keen not to go down a completely figurative route again. I'd already put myself in the picture through the self portrait work earlier in the course and felt uncomfortable using my daughter's image in that way. Using the bears as a symbol allowed me to suggest aspects of her essence instead. The idea then, was becoming clearer but still didn't quite have the edge I needed to give it that little bit of quirky sparkle. Which is where the Identikit came in. I started to carry out research on the internet. My original hope being maybe to construct the bears three dimensionally, somehow piecing together bits of bears to create the desired effect. I gave up on this fairly quickly as the practicalities would have resulted, I'm sure, in creatures much like those created by the twisted Sid in Toy Story! I was then keen to use original Identikit elements from the 1960's and 70's to construct my own Bear identikit set. Sadly (because I thought the idea was cool!), this also met an unresolved end, when it proved impossible to get hold of the original identikit sets. I had been doing some paintings with my GCSE students in the style of the German Expressionist painters, and resolved to continue this expressive, painterly approach, utilising elements of identikit facial re-construction.
The idea of juxtaposing the soft and cute teddies with the harsh realities of criminal life appealed to me. The criminality representative of one's potential at birth. I was trying to say somethin
g about the harshness of the world into which my daughter was being born. Of course, great things happen every day, but these are peppered by the horrific things which seem to dominate the news. Giving the bears this criminal undercurrent spoke to me of this ever present evil which surrounds us. Also of the potential we all have as children. To follow one path (the bear) and become moral and just citizens, or to react against it and become the criminal undercurrent.
had a sense of the innocence of a child. Their faces perma-frozen in a state of cute bewilderment. The fluffiness of them added to their cuteness and gave them a sense of fragility and softness. They were ideal vessels to represent my daughter. I had ben keen not to go down a completely figurative route again. I'd already put myself in the picture through the self portrait work earlier in the course and felt uncomfortable using my daughter's image in that way. Using the bears as a symbol allowed me to suggest aspects of her essence instead. The idea then, was becoming clearer but still didn't quite have the edge I needed to give it that little bit of quirky sparkle. Which is where the Identikit came in. I started to carry out research on the internet. My original hope being maybe to construct the bears three dimensionally, somehow piecing together bits of bears to create the desired effect. I gave up on this fairly quickly as the practicalities would have resulted, I'm sure, in creatures much like those created by the twisted Sid in Toy Story! I was then keen to use original Identikit elements from the 1960's and 70's to construct my own Bear identikit set. Sadly (because I thought the idea was cool!), this also met an unresolved end, when it proved impossible to get hold of the original identikit sets. I had been doing some paintings with my GCSE students in the style of the German Expressionist painters, and resolved to continue this expressive, painterly approach, utilising elements of identikit facial re-construction.The idea of juxtaposing the soft and cute teddies with the harsh realities of criminal life appealed to me. The criminality representative of one's potential at birth. I was trying to say somethin
g about the harshness of the world into which my daughter was being born. Of course, great things happen every day, but these are peppered by the horrific things which seem to dominate the news. Giving the bears this criminal undercurrent spoke to me of this ever present evil which surrounds us. Also of the potential we all have as children. To follow one path (the bear) and become moral and just citizens, or to react against it and become the criminal undercurrent.
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