About a year ago, I visited a studio in central Vermont and saw some work based on Peruvian mummies. The pieces were wrapped in colorful cloth and earthy tones and hung in shadow boxes. I wanted to use the idea in some way in pieces that I do. I did a piece for the porch based on what I had seen but envisioned the parcels as something wrapped by a black widow spider. I wrapped arms and legs from my Barbie doll parts with tattered strips of colorful clothe and wound that with monofilament line to simulate a spider’s silk thread.
I expanded the idea to a series of five shadowboxes on barn board containing similar wrapped body parts. Each box also contained bone circles as contrasting background inside the box. As a header for the piece, I used a piece of driftwood that ran the width of the barn board. The driftwood had a small indentation about midway. The idea that I was playing with was a black widow spider nest egg for a rainy day or some kind of automated delicatessen with preserved body parts for man-eating spiders. I don’t know where this idea came from, but I have it and have to live with it.
Meanwhile, I found a piece of melted glassed (the bottom of a bottle) that had been in a fire. It caught my eye because it was shaped just like a mouth and lips. I hollowed out the indentation in the barn board and glued in the glass with lots of gorilla glue. It foamed up great when it dried so it looked like a mouth foaming and frothing. I got another idea for the piece. I inserted a small hand so it protruded from the lips. Hanging from the end of the barn board, I attached an old, rusted serving fork. From my pantry, I got a can of Manwich Sandwich in order to get the label. I cut out two pieces to glue inside of the two shadowboxes. One said “Manwich Sandwich” and the other said “Joe’s special meat sauce”.
I decided to call the piece The Donner Party.
In August, after the flooding, I did a sale in order to donate all proceeds to disaster relief locally. I was delighted when my friend Ginny came by an indicated that she wished to buy The Donner Party ... only if I would change the name!
For some strange reason, I do not expect this piece to sell.
November 2011 - I stand corrected. I sold this to my friend Ginny!
