jennifer angus

I first saw Jennifer Angus' work at the Museum of Art and Design's "Dead or Alive" show last year in NYC.  (See my blog post about that show here) Her work combines my obsession for art, textiles, repeating patterns, and bugs together, so I absolutely love it and love her for doing it! Yes, I have a weird fascination with bugs. As scared and grossed out by most bugs as I am, I find them amazing little creatures and they come in the most beautiful colors and designs. They rank high with me for design inspiration, as do birds, tropical fish and chameleons.  Butterflies are beautiful, but Jennifer prefers to use bugs like beetles and weevils, (weevils are my favorite, I have done a lot of art in the past with weevils) Jennifer uses the same bugs over and over again for her installations.  Here she explains how she acquires the bugs- Working with Insects-The Ethics.  If you are in the Los Angeles area, please check out her current show All Creatures Great and Small at the Craft and Folk Art Museum which will be up until September 11, 2011. After that her work will be featured at the Memorial Art Gallery in Rochester, NY from October 22, 2011 to January 15th 2012. (Which by the way has a fiberarts exhibition that looks pretty great and is open until July 3rd) 

 

Visit Jennifer's webpage here

dead or alive- museum of arts and design, nyc

http://madmuseum.org/

Unfortunately this show ended in October but it was the most amazing group of work I have ever seen! The photos do not do it  justice, these are a few from the book that I bought at the museum which is still available online. I don't even have photos of my favorite pieces. One by Alastair Mackie (you can view most of the show at the website above) was a weaving loom with some beautiful fabric in a gorgeous color woven on it, and a pile of white "shavings" on the floor below it. I stood and stared for a while trying to guess what it was all made out of and it turns out the "shavings" were mouse bones, the fabric was woven out of mouse fur. I really love when something that is considered "dirty, gross, ugly" etc can be made into something beautiful. And in my mind, everything in nature, even the ugliest things, can be viewed as beautiful in some way shape or form, or transformed into something beautiful. Anyone who knows me well knows that everything in this show is either something I would want to create myself, or something I would put in my house! Art made from beetles, bones or feathers tends to be some of my favorite stuff!

This skull was made by Fabian Peña out of cockroach wing fragments, translucent paper and light boxes.

Spice Skulls by Helen Altman were constructed of  over sixty types of various spices and held together with wire and gelatin.

Sagittarius by Shen Shaomin is made of bone, bone meal and glue.

Point by Tim Hawkinson was made with eggshells, I have no idea how he held them together!

Definitely check out Jennifer Angus, http://www.jenniferangus.com/home.htm my favorite artist from the show who I just realized has a few upcoming shows, one in Philly which ends Jan 3rd. Her work reminds me of all the stuff I was trying to do a few years ago. I still have boxes of exotic beetles and butterflies in my closet...if you didn't think I was weird before, you do now, right? :)

Here are two bug (and chameleon) inspired pieces I did a few years ago. The first is a Photoshop collage, the second an oil painting with real beetles inside plastic bubbles. Nature is really the most inspiring thing for me when it comes to artwork.

copyright 2011 by Lesley Merola