Room IN A Room
These works developed from maquettes which are
themselves realisations of dreamlike revelations that came about as I looked round an exhibition of Jaqueline Poncelet's house-works made for Sheelagh O'Donell's house/gallery in Bath in 2002.
Sheelagh wanted artists to respond to the 'spirit of place in her restored C18 terraced house on a hill.
I walked round stimulated by the challenge to recognise Jaqueline's work installed among the minimal household furnishings in Sheelagh's home.
Still exploring my own subject matter; 'Maenads on a mobius strip' I tried to imagine them situated in her downstairs tunnel back room and, wanting to loop them through one of the walls, I devised a plan to build a 'room in a room'. with enough room between the inner and outer walls to allow a visitor to walk between
The silent figures imagined in the small back bedroom morphed into the terrible remains, seen in a newspaper photograph, of Bosnian villagers massacred, buried twice and finally returned to their villages, the skeletal remains still in their clothes.
The small maquette was abstract but held my intention. I meant to sew flat textile figures and hang them on stick supports in full size, rather as they appear as plastic wires in the maquette. I had wires stretched across my studio ceiling to tie bean sticks for a full size version.
Room in a room
This work was never fully realised in an actual space and is something I would like to achieve at some point in the future if a suitable space presents itself for such an installation.