Perceptual Dissonance

Rebecca Selleck

Perceptual Dissonance

Rebecca Selleck Perceptual Dissonance 2

Abstract This project seeks a sculptural presence for conflicting perceptions of non-‐human animals

and the resultant sensation of perceptual dissonance. Originally searching for a specific

sculptural language with which to evoke empathy in the viewer through objects, the use of

animal hides as a device created important personal and conceptual issues that the

resulting research was reframed around. Through the exploration of four introduced species

within Australia, the cow, sheep, rabbit and fox, the desired sculptural presence and

resultant perceptual dissonance found form through the use of three main devices: animal

hides given back basic shape, domestic objects to create a bodily connection with the

viewer, and simple electronics that give a semblance of life. It is hoped these semi-‐

autobiographical pieces can drive the viewer to question the validity of their own

perceptions relating to non-‐human animals by demonstrating the constructed nature of

human understanding and, through emotional engagement, can provoke new ways of

thinking about non-‐human animals.


Acknowledgements This has been a tough, but incredibly worthwhile, year. I could never have made it to this point without some very important people in my life. I’d firstly like to thank my supervisors, Paul Hay and Wendy Teakel. Paul, for making sure we always keep things in perspective and Wendy for her unwavering care and guidance. Thank you to all the lecturers and technical staff at the sculpture workshop, you’ve all been so generous with your time and advice. Thank you to Tom and Sian. Studying together for the last four years has been a blast and I can’t think of two better partners in crime with which to complete my Honours year. Thank you to everyone at the Sculpture workshop. We’re a family. You’ve all helped shape me as a person and artist.

Thank you to Raquel Ormella, our Honours Supervisor, whose incredible knowledge on the subject of human and non-‐human animal relationships helped steer me in the right theoretical direction. And thank you to the incredible Amanda Stuart, for taking the time out to talk to me about my work and share her insights.

The most love soaked thanks go out to my beautiful family and partner. My family for always being there for me, my little niece Eleanor for being my muse, and to Mark for being my rock and absolute love of my life.

I’d also like to thank the amazing non-‐human animals in my life. Skye, Maurice and Lanna: Some of the most loveable animals I could ever hope to know. When at times this journey made it feel like death surrounded me, your cuddles, friendship and general shenanigans filled me with happiness again.


Table of Contents

List of Illustrations 6

Introduction 12

The Cow

Illustrations

Text

15

16

19

The Sheep

Illustrations

Text

21

22

23

The Cow Continued

Illustrations

Text

25

26

28

The Rabbits

Illustrations

Text

32

33

35

The Foxes

Illustrations

Text

38

39

42

Conclusion

46

Bibliography

Other Reading

47

48


List of Illustrations The Cow Figure 1: Patricia Piccinini

Undivided, 2004 Silicone, human hair, flannelette, mixed 101 x 74 x 127 cm

Figure 2:

Patricia Piccinini The Listener, 2013 Silione, fibreglass, human hair, speaker 97cm H x 45cm x 45cm

Figure 3:

Rebecca Selleck Cow/Soft Toy, 2015 Cow pelt, bed, steel, plaster, cotton, wool insulation, synthetic stuffing, plastic tube, rubber, electronics 150 x 210 x 130cm

Figure 4:

Berlinde De Bruyckere K36 (The Black Horse), 2003 Polyurethane foam, horse hide, wood, iron 295 x 286 x 158 cm

Figure 5:

Sutee Kunavichayanont The Myth from the Rice Field (Breath Donation), 1998 Latex rubber, air balloon, hose Dimensions variable

Figure 6:

Still from L’Age D’Or, 1930 Screenplay by Luis Bunuel and Salvador Dali Director Luis Bunuel

Figure 7:

Testing the form in Photoshop with found images

Figure 8: Louise Bourgeois Cell (clothes), 1996 wood, glass, fabric, rubber 211 x 442 x 266 cm

Figure 9:

Louise Bourgeois Cell (clothes), 1996 (detail)


Figure 10:

Trying to find form

Figure 11:

Clay maquette

Figure 12:

Armature

Figure 13:

Armature

Figure 14:

Armature

Figure 15:

Motor on welded steel stand

Figure 16:

Detail of spine

Figure 17: Stitching on pelt

The Sheep

Figure 18:

Damien Hirst Away from the Flock, 1994 Glass, painted steel, silicone, acrylic, plastic, lamb and formaldehyde solution 96 x 149 x 51cm Edition 3 of 3 + 1 AP

Figure 19:

Rebecca Selleck Six sheep in a bath, 2015 Digital image

Figure 20:

Rebecca Selleck Six sheep in a bath inside out, 2015 Digital image

Figure 21: Left to Right -‐ Tests in warmer tones and final photographs


The Cow Continued

Figure 22:

Trying new legs

Figure 23:

Stephanie Metz Lapdog, 2005 Felted wool, taxidermy plastic eyes 14 x 4 x 24cm

Figure 24:

Katherina Mossinger Kuscheltier I (Stuffed Animal I), 2004 pig skin, filling material, polyester 100 x 185 x 120 cm

Figure 25:

Re-‐sewn and with plastic tubing

Figure 26:

New motor configuration

Figure 27:

Sound insulation

Figure 28:

Removed springs

Figure 29:

Bolted down edges

Figure 30:

‘Gravity’ in cow form and bed

The Rabbits Figure 31:

Rebecca Selleck Fenkata/Watering Hole, 2015 Rabbit pelts, found objects, electrics, heated wiring, steel, fabric, synthetic stuffing 150 x 230 x 110cm

Figure 32:

Rabbit plague Spencer Gulf 1963. Photo: National Archives of Australia

Figure 33:

Fenkata (Maltese rabbit stew) Source: http://www.sbs.com.au/

Figure 34:

Chloe Brown ‘They abide and they endure’, 2006 Mounted mice, school desks and chairs Dimensions variable


Figure 35: Stripped table

Figure 36: Rough carving in of depressions and pot hole

Figure 37:

Hidden powerboard

Figure 38:

Stained table with armetures

Figure 39:

Finished table before changes

Figure 40:

Wild rabbit pelts

Figure 41:

Metal armeture

Figure 42:

With padding and fabric

Figure 43:

With wiring

Figure 44:

Finished piece

The Foxes Figure 45:

Rebecca Selleck Lovers/Scoundrels, 2015 Fox pelts, found rocking chairs, found timber, electronics, steel, fabric, synthetic stuffing 40 x 40 x 125cm

Figure 46:

‘The Animals of Farthing Wood’, 1992-‐95 European Broadcasting Union

Figure 47:

Found small rocking chairs before interventions

Figure 48:

Natalie Ryan Eucalypt print cotton

Figure 49:

Rod Mcrae Operation Foxtrot, 2010 Rearrangable red foxes Dimensions variable

Figure 50:

Polly Morgan Still life after death (fox), 2006 Red fox, glass Dimensions unknown

Figure 51:

Fox pelt purchased from internet


Figure 52:

Angela Singer Hedgerow, 2010 Vintage Recycled Taxidermy With Mixed Media Dimensions unknown

Figure 53:

Angela Singer Sore, 2001-‐2 Wax, Foam Glass, Mixed Media Dimensions unknown

Figure 54:

Angela Singer Dripsy Dropsy, 2006 Vintage Recycled Taxidermy With Mixed Media Dimensions unknown

Figure 55: First paint job

Figure 56: Fox face

Figure 57:

Metal Armature

Figure 58:

Armature with padding and cotton

Figure 59:

Sewing on the pelt

Figure 60:

Amanda Stuart Red Dog 2013 cast bronze 62 x 138 x 22cm edition of 5

Figure 61:

Finished piece


Introduction I’ve always been entranced by the inconsistent relationships humans have with other

animals. We can easily empathise and identify with them on the one hand, and yet on the

other can disengage: denying them agency and treating them as objects. Representations of

animals find their way into our perceptions, but rather than forming a smooth whole, they

exist in separate parts of our mind ready for appropriate contextual usage. In the rare

moments when these perceptions touch, there is a strange sensation. A perceptual

dissonance.

This year, I have been giving that moment physical form. So I question:

How can I give sculptural presence to my conflicting perceptions of non-‐human

animals and the resulting sensation of perceptual dissonance?

It’s my hope that through the resultant body of work, viewers will be driven to question the

validity of their own respective perceptions relating to non-‐human animals. By giving

physical presence to such perceptions, the resulting works demonstrate the constructed

nature of human understanding and, through emotional engagement, can provoke new

ways of thinking about non-‐human animals. As, ‘the artist and the animal are, it seems,

intimately bound up with each other in the unthinking or undoing of the conventionally

human’.1

For my Honours project I have focused on four animals: The cow, sheep, rabbit and fox.

They are all mammals, so similar to humans in many ways, but in contemporary Australian

culture cows and sheep are also commercial products through their milk, skin and flesh,

while rabbits and foxes are pests for eradication due to their destructive impact on native

flora and fauna. They are all also species introduced into Australia by humans: the former

for their productive value and the latter originally for recreational hunting. All can be legally

killed and their remains sold commercially.

1 Nigel Rothfels, ed., Representing Animals (Indiana, USA: Indiana University Press, 2002), 80.


The hides of each of these animals speak of this placement on a hierarchy, as contemporary

commercial objects that result from the legal death and disfigurement of animals that we

can empathise with. Through reappropriation of their typical usages through sculptural

form, they are therefore able to communicate a powerful presence to conflicting

perceptions of non-‐human animals.

It’s been my aim to find a specific sculptural language that gives communicable presence to

the moment my conflicting perceptions and their accompanying sensations clash: The push

and pull of empathy and disengagement that results in perceptual dissonance. I have

explored this through the use of three primary devices: the skins of each animal given

simplistic form, domestic objects that create a psychological and bodily connection with the

viewer, and finally through the use of basic electronics that create a semblance of life. These

simulate breath and movement or offer warmth. The resulting works are semi-‐

autobiographical, and sculptural and photographic in medium, combining reimagined

animal forms that return limited agency to the subject.

As my original ideas were forming, I was mainly influenced by artists Patricia Piccinini,

Louise Bourgeois and Berlinde de Bruykere, although I struggled to find a theoretical basis.

As my research progressed, I became greatly influenced by author Steven Baker, whose

conceptualisation of contemporary art practice concerning non-‐human animals, under the

framework of ‘Botched Taxidermy’2, allowed my practice to find its footing. Through this, I

have researched an array of relevant artists who have helped inform my work this year

including Polly Morgan, Angela Singer, and Rod McRae. Throughout this paper, I will

elaborate Baker’s term ‘Botched Taxidermy’ and how this key idea and related artists

helped frame and inform my research. I will also reference other texts that helped guide my

Honours journey, including the books ‘What I don’t know about animals’3, and

‘Representing Animals’4.

2 Steve Baker, Postmodern Animal: Essays in Art and Culture (London, UK: Reaktion Books, 2000). See also: Rothfels, Representing Animals and Steve Baker "Something’s Gone Wrong Again", Antenna 7 (2008): 4-10, accessed July 15, 2015. http://www.antennae.org.uk/back-issues-2008/4583459061 3 Jenny, Diski What I Don't Know About Animals (New Haven, CT, USA: Yale University Press, 2011). 4 Rothfels, Representing Animals


This paper has been chronologically organised to give narrative to my Honours journey. A

journey that was at the same time technical, conceptual and personal. I will discuss in how

my research evolved through dealing with my own conflicting perceptions, as well as the

commercial remains, of the cow, sheep, rabbit and fox. I will also give more detail to the

other devices, the domestic objects and electronic/mechanical semblances of life, that

helped activate my final work and answer my final research question.


The Cow


Illustrations

Figure 1 Figure 2

Figure 3

Figure 4

Figure 5 Figure 6


Figure 7

Figure 8

Figure 9

Figure 10

Figure 11

Figure 12

Figure 13

Figure 14


Figure 15

Figure 16

Figure 17


When I started this year, I was continuing my third year research that questioned:

How can I create sculpture that evokes an empathic response in the viewer?

A key artist for me at this point was Patricia Piccinini, whose lifelike and confronting

sculptures are often successful in this way (fig 1&2). After looking closer at Piccinini’s work, I

noted that an important device she employed for enhancing empathic engagement with the

viewer was the incorporation of relatable domestic settings.

My first major piece was this cow form (fig 3), which explored the idea of domestic setting

as a key device. The intention was to have an anonymous cow object, rendered helpless

through its lack of a head or usable limbs, perched and slowly ‘breathing’ on the end of a

bed. I was influenced by Berlinde de Bruyckere, whose tragic taxidermy horse forms deprive

the animal of agency through a lack of usable limbs or features (fig 4) and Thai artist Sutee

Kunavichayananont who uses ‘breath’ to give a semblance of life to his animal works (fig 5).

The work also references a still from a Salvador Dali film that I found captivating because of

its surreal juxtaposition of a large outdoor animal with an intimately human space5 (fig 6).

The bed presents a size and softness that leads to a spatially pleasing composition with the

cow form. The relationship is intimately human when contrasted with our detached

understanding of real cows. I chose this particular bed-‐frame as it reminded me of one I had

as a child. Wanting to test the concept before starting, I made a couple of mock-‐ups on a

computer from stock images (fig 7).

While I could keep emotionally distant while the concept was in digital form, as my project

progressed into the sourcing of materials I found myself distressed. Sickened by my search

through hundreds of size, colour and pattern variables for the ‘perfect’ hide that seemed

‘friendly’, I started to see the hide as much more than a device for inducing empathy in the

5 L’Age d’Or. Directed by Luis Bunuel. Performed by Gaston Modot, Lya Lys, Max Ernst (France: Corinth Films, 1930) Film.


viewer. I began to ask:

How can I use sculpture to explore the philosophical space between animal and

object?

For me, the skin of an animal as an artefact is so powerfully expressive of this confusing

conceptual space. It was at this point my own hypocrisy began to dawn on me, as evidenced

through the purposeful physical acting out of my concurrent yet conflicting perceptions of

the objectified animal. My research had begun to take its first shifts towards

autobiographical tableau, influenced by the confessional art and psychological spaces

created by Louise Bourgeois, which also involve the use of domestic objects (fig 8 & 9).

This was also the point where I started to find my footing in relevant theoretical research

and historical context, influenced by the book ‘What I Don’t Know About Animals’. In this,

Diski gives a personal narrative from childhood to adulthood of her interactions and

perceptions of non-‐human animals to demonstrate the human authorship that constructs

ideas of animals, as well as our perpetual inability to know the perspective of another

species6. Her realisations are consistent with the shift of animal representation in art. These

shifts are evident in the use of animal representation as aesthetic devices or vehicles for

expressing the human condition, to contemporary art, where the presence of the animal as

agent is acknowledged and the confusing philosophical space between us is given form, as

described in the introductions to Artist Animal7 and in Representing Animals8.

I began preliminary construction by draping the cow hide over piled linen in order to find

the form (fig 10). It was so flat, and so difficult to find the memory of the body that was

once within. After referring to anatomical images and creating clay and wire maquettes (fig

11), I welded the armature, using thick steel rod to make it durable, have weight and give

the semblance of bone. I gave it a removable steel base plate with a stand for housing the

mechanised components within. For added protection and to provide anchors for my later

6 Diski, What I Don’t Know About Animals 7 Steve Baker, Artist Animal (Minneapolis, USA: The University of Minnesota Press, 2013). 8 Rothfels, Representing Animals


stitching, I attached a taut layer of chicken wire over the initial armature (fig 12).

A layer of cotton was then securely stitched into this to protect the internal components

from the next layers (fig 13), which comprised plaster-‐dipped hessian, carved back and

sanded into the semblance of a spine and limb joints, and sewn in pockets allowing for

variable fat wads of synthetic stuffing to evoke a rounded form (fig 13). I constructed the

mechanisms by creating a double cam system off a small motor (fig 14) and had it working

inside, although it was strained and unsuitably loud. I began my thinking into how to amend

this.

In completing the outer layer, I used contact adhesive to secure the hide to the spine and

accentuate the semblance of bone (fig 16). With the skin over the new body, I cut out where

the legs would lay. The hide was hand sewn to the armature with careful darting around

the curves to create a lifelike tension to the skin (fig 17). As the needles made their passes

through the hide and the scissors cut through fur and skin, I felt heavy. A little sick. I

physically felt the continuing agency of the animal body as my conflicting perceptions of

‘cow’ touched.

At this point, I took a break from the cow form to write, think and consider what was

happening in order to resolve the work. My research and practice had drawing closer and

closer to myself. My bed, my perceptions, my guilt.


The Sheep


Illustrations

Figure 18

Figure 19

Figure 20

Figure 21


‘The way animals are understood is bound in time and place, and the careful scrutiny

of that understanding reveals not only important limits to our knowledge of animals

but important limits to our knowledge of ourselves.’9

My next work happened organically as a result of my work so far and a heightened

awareness of my own hypocrisy. I had another moment of perceptual dissonance. While

this photographic set is not a part of my final body of work, it was a synthesizing point in my

Honours journey.

In my living room I had a big, old sheepskin rug, which through use needed a wash. I

chucked it in our bathtub. With the water and soap suds moving through the wool and

softening the skin it was suddenly activated. It was like commonplace Damian Hirst (fig 18).

Within the intimate, domestic space of a bathtub I was on my hands and knees washing not

another human or even a pet, but the skin of six long dead sheep stitched together. This

nurturing act was eerily empty. Realising again the continuing power of the animal body

beyond death, I was reminded of a quote from artist Susan Shaw Sailer:

‘The most striking thing I have learned more recently from my own roadkill work is

how visually uncontainable its animal material proved (and proves) to be, spilling over,

as if with an afterlife of its own.’10

In retrospect, this sculptural moment of washing my sheepskin rug stood out to me as it

combined the elements I found most important in answering my main research question:

The legal skin of an animal, a domestic object to contain it, and a lifelike activation: in this

case through the movement of water. Though as a photograph, I needed to give its two-‐

dimensional form enough physical presence to draw the viewer in.

Grabbing my digital camera, I stood above this sculptural moment. The perspective and

9 Rothels, Representing Animals, xii 10 Baker, Artist Animal, 206-‐7


movement of the water made it a writhing object. I wanted to capture its entirety on both

sides: its woolly sheep side looking almost foetal in position (fig 19) and its underside now

so slippery and reminiscent of entrails (fig 20). I zoomed my lens out to 24mm and set my

aperture to f/22 to keep the bath and skin in equal focus. To make up for the depth of field

and the fast shutter speed of 1/200th of a second needed to allow for crispness of the water

and to avoid camera shake, both of which restrict the amount of light entering the lens, I

used a higher ISO of 640 and bounced a flash off the ceiling. The higher ISO added a slight

graininess to the image while the flash made the dank water mirror like, rendering the form

hard and soft at the same time. When editing, I skewed and cropped the images to be of

identical frame. After playing with various colour balances (fig 21), I chose cooler tones to

lessen the visceral nature of the subject and make it less immediately confronting.

The final images have been printed on soft fabric and mounted on a bodily scale to help

communicate my conflicting perceptions of sheep and the resultant perceptual dissonance

of that moment. While these photographs employ the main devices used in my body of

work and are successful in answering my research question through communicating my

conflicting perceptions of non-‐human animals and the resulting sensation of perceptual

dissonance, they do not have the same consideration put into construction and form. They

also lack the ability to physically draw the viewer in, as they lack negative space in the third

dimension. For the sake of a cohesive body of work, I decided not to include them in the

final selection. However, the personal revelations evoked by their creation were essential in

the progress of my Honours work. Through realising the power of my own conflicting

perceptions and hypocrisy when in physical form, I was able to return to my cow form with

a clearer understanding of its purpose.


The Cow Continued


Illustrations

Figure 22

Figure 23

Figure 24

Figure 25

Figure 26

Figure 27


Figure 28

Figure 29

Figure 30


Returning to the cow with personal insight from the sheep and conceptual underpinnings

from my new research, I recognised that the form needed to be more ambiguous and

removed the plaster spine and leg joints. I sewed the legs on as little useless pads (fig 22).

This was partly inspired by Stephanie Metz’s felt sculptures, which take ideas of animal

purpose-‐breeding to absurd conclusions (fig 23). For me, though, it had become a reminder

of the soft toys I had as a child. The anthropomorphised and comforting friends that

resembled animals, but weren’t, and slept safely in my bed each night. This sculpture is

neither cow, the big animal into which we’ve bred docility to more easily supply us with

milk, meat and leather, nor cow, the beautiful animal with big pools for eyes that I want to

hug and be friends with, nor cow, the soft toy representation that helped establish my

longing for the friendship. The sculpture became all these perceptions combined and

accordingly my research question shifted from the philosophical space between object and

animal to:

How can I give sculptural presence to my inability to reconcile childhood and adult

perceptions of non-‐human animals?

Looking at artist Katherina Mossinger (fig 24), who creates disturbing pieces by using hides

in toy-‐like representations of the animals, I further considered the balance between living

and toy in a single representation and how to not make that too overwhelming for the

viewer. While the face is the most confronting element in Mossinger’s work, something my

work lacks, it still gave me room to think about hybridity of living/inanimate form. I decided

I needed to make the visual references to soft toy slightly stronger in the legs and closer to

living animal in the torso. I unpicked and resewed the entire hide, this time with a closer

stitch and tighter pull across the torso and, glued foam along the hide’s edges to create a

separation from the body. The ‘legs’ were stitched back on to look like the jointed legs of a

soft toy. I used flexible plastic along the join to accentuate this separation and offer a

contrast of synthetic against skin (fig 25).

I still needed to create a substantially subtler visual and aural simulation of breath. This was

of high importance to a work that relies on a semblance of life to return to the animal a

small sense of agency to contrast its lack thereof, with ‘breath’ providing an engagement


point with which to connect bodily. 11 I replaced the motor and gearbox with a high-‐torque

low-‐RPM combined unit on a revised mounting plate (fig 26). In eliminating the plastic

gearbox used originally, I could use thicker stainless steel rod in the rotating arm for added

durability. I used oxy-‐acetylene heating to create clean bends and mechanical couplers with

cold weld epoxy glue to secure the arm to the motor. The configuration runs off a 12V 2.5A

AC connection, with wiring concealed through the bedding and mattress. After testing

various sound proofing materials, the noise issue was resolved by using rubber to absorb

immediate vibration and wool insulation to absorb residual sound (fig 27).

Wanting the work to be an object in space, rather than completed by the room it occupied, I

moved it away from the wall. This allows the viewer to walk around the work, but as the

power cord is visible lessens the suspension of disbelief regarding the life of the cow form. I

trialed devices that would connect the use of a power cord in the viewers’ minds to an

external object and found a white tall lamp to be least distracting. The cord for this runs

under the bed, where it meets the hidden powerboard that the cow runs off.

The final touches on this sculpture included spray-‐painting the bed frame matte white and

dressing the bed in white linen to avoid visual distraction and allow for a single focal point. I

also used bolt cutters to remove a section of bedsprings where the cow form would rest

from the mattress and used plywood with nuts and bolts to put pressure around the edges

(fig 28 & 29). By removing all but the bedhead wheels, I created a lean in the bed. These

interventions give the effect of the cow form being of equal weight to an actual cow, giving

the final work a sense of both physical and conceptual gravity (fig 30).

At this point, with a work that effectively articulated the perceptual dissonance caused by

my conflicting perceptions of non-‐human animals, and aware that my perceptions weren’t a

binary divided by age, but a social continuum, my research question had its final

incarnation:

11 Rothfels, Representing Animals, p77


How can I give sculptural presence to my conflicting perceptions of non-‐human

animals and the resulting sensation of perceptual dissonance?

Through the contemporary conceptual framework of ‘Botched Taxidermy’ that includes the

animal and the human, without being either, but instead ‘are things with which to think,

rather than themselves being things to be thought about… to prompt a moment of

perplexity and non-‐recognition, of genuine thinking’12, I had found my final footing.

12 Baker, Postmodern Animal, p75


The Rabbits


Illustrations

Figure 31 Figure 32

Figure 33 Figure 34

Figure 35 Figure 36

Figure 37 Figure 38


Figure 39 Figure 40

Figure 41 Figure 42

Figure 43 Figure 44


My next work involved rabbits (fig 31). In Australia, I grew up with an understanding of

rabbits as pests. An introduced species that had been destroying the landscape in plague

proportions for decades (fig 32). But, rabbits are also an important part of my Maltese

culture and history. The Maltese national meal is Fenkata (fig 33), a rabbit stew. As an

Australian of Maltese descent, I have memories of sitting with extended family around a

dark wood dining table with a large pot of stew at the centre. There is also rabbit: my fluffy

friend.

My aim was to make work that combined these conflicting personal and social memories of

rabbits and give them sculptural presence. I was also influenced by the idea of playing into

traditional taxidermy, in order to better disrupt it. Over time, to give a greater sense of

vitality to inert forms, ‘taxidermic aesthetics... developed from static displays… to arrested

action poses, to the environmental dioramas first pioneered in the early parts of the

twentieth century.’13 I wanted to use this 20th Century convention to better activate my own

work. I was reminded of Choe Brown’s work, ‘They abide and they endure’, which also used

‘vermin’ mammals in a tableau set up of multiple forms (fig 34). This distinction between

individual and plague greatly effects our engagement with an animal. In my work, an old,

found, claw-‐foot table would be transformed to exist somewhere between rabbit plagued

landscape and a domestic object during family dinner. One thing I learnt from my journey

with the cow was that I needed to think of the components of my sculptures as a singular

entity, rather than separately. I stripped and resurfaced the table to contain the new

elements (fig 35). I gave a new pot the impression of age by sandblasting, oiling and boiling

it dry, and made a perfect hole in the table for it to sink into. With water raised to table

level, this would be the watering hole/stew pot. I then carved depressions into the table for

the ladle and rabbit forms to rest (fig 36).

Because of the sense of visual movement when using multiples, and wanting a predominate

stillness to this work with which viewers could then engage, I eliminated the movement of

‘breath’ as used in the cow piece. I decided on the subtlety of warmth to give a sense of life.

This strange surprise would be realised through the viewers’ touch once enticed by the

13 Rothels, Representing Animals, 160


rounded forms with their soft, furry skins.

To achieve the necessary warmth, I unstitched the insulated cords out of heated caps and,

through the advice of an electrician, upgraded all the joins and plugs to Australian

standards. Underneath the table top I routed lines in which to conceal cords, and down the

side of the leg carved out a place for the power board line to run (fig 37). The entire table,

minus the claw feet, was then given a coat of walnut tinted stain and finally a layer of

lacquer. The rabbit forms were carved sections of foam with cotton stitched over the top

(fig 38). Into the cotton I stitched in the heated cord, careful not to have any section touch

or the needle puncture the plastic insulation. Then the hides were sewn over the tops with

some synthetic stuffing between skin and heating elements (fig 39).

I had the opportunity to exhibit at the Front Gallery and Cafe earlier this year, where I could

test people’s responses to the cow and rabbit works14. Responses moved along a spectrum

of empathy and disconnection, but always somewhere in the confusion between. In this

way the work is successful in answering my research question.

However, upon reflection I realised the multi-‐coloured skins in the rabbit piece spoke too

much of pet rabbits and not wild ones. I then purchased the skins of more rabbits, this time

wild (fig 40). Another sickening moment of personal perceptual dissonance. The wild skins

are larger and softer than the other hides, so it was easier to find a more rabbit-‐like form. I

used galvanised wire and chicken wire to make skeletal forms with the tactile semblance of

vertebrae (fig 41), then stitched in layers of synthetic padding and cotton jersey to give

flesh-‐like softness and to create a safe barrier between the metal and heated cord (fig 42).

I also reflected that the heat from the original forms was too intense to speak of

mammalian life. This was solved by sharing each heated cord between two to three forms,

so increasing the space between the cord and subsequently decreasing the accumulated

heat (fig 43). The connecting cord ran under the table top through a series of concealed

14 Janet Rankin and Rebecca Selleck “Tracing Steps.” The Front Gallery and Café: 1 Wattle Pl, Lyneham ACT 2602. 19 August, 2015.


holes with extra insulation around turns. The thinness of the cord allowed me to easily

conceal this space with dark synthetic felt.

Wanting to further activate the space of the sculpture, I extended the range of the rabbit

forms to include one seeming to climb up the base of the table and another perched on the

floor nearby. In order to heat these forms without obvious wiring, I used a rug to conceal

cords. I had considered a low plinth, but felt that this would create a psychological barrier to

audience engagement whereas the rug would be more of a familiar extension of the whole

form. I found a used, traditional rug of medium size to blend with the table, with a dark

colour to show less dirt from foot traffic. The rug also defines the physical space for the

viewer, deepening the psychological engagement as they enter the parameters of the work.

There are now ten large rabbit forms across the table and climbing up from the bottom,

creating another inconsistent relationship as they converge on the watering hole/stew pot:

the giver of life/death. These alterations have denoted a greater sense of plague in scale,

and more of an empathic weight in form (fig 44).

The discarded original rabbit forms became the genesis of a new sculpture that isn’t part of

my final body of work. They sit huddled together on a found stool I simply transformed with

a carved depression on the seat and several coats of white paint.


The Foxes


Illustrations

Figure 45 Figure 46

Figure 47 Figure 48

Figure 49 Figure 50


Figure 51

Figure 52

Figure 53

Figure 54

Figure 55

Figure 56

Figure 57 Figure 58


Figure 59

Figure 60

Figure 61


Earlier this year I met a fox for the first time. She is a semi-‐tame fox who scavenges the local

dump and occasionally visits the store there. We stared at each other for a few seconds

before she trotted off. She seemed a glowing, impossible creature to me, but no one

seemed perturbed by her presence; I had to ask a staff member about it, as I secretly feared

I was hallucinating. I wasn’t and her name is Foxy. This was an incredibly surreal encounter

for me, and one that I haven’t been able to stop thinking about.

I deduced Foxy seemed unreal to me as representations of foxes I had encountered in my

life largely comprised anthropomorphised depictions and real-‐world roadkill: static in death.

I wanted my next work to embody the resulting perceptions that led to my wonderment of

this encountered life, but through reformed hides and displaced movement that mimicks

life reveal a deeper sadness and confusion around the foxes’ place in contemporary

Australian society (fig 45).

A prominent anthropomorphised depiction of foxes during my life was an English cartoon

called ‘The Animals of Farthing Wood’15 (fig 46). In this television show, a pair of clever red

foxes were the moral leaders of a community of forest animals. They were also very much

in love. This memory inspired me to use two foxes: creating a visual dialogue between them

as they slowly rock back and forth on small found rocking chairs (fig 47).

Had ‘The Animals of Farthing Wood’ been made in Australia, no such reverence would have

been given to the fox. Foxes were introduced along with rabbits by Europeans for

recreational hunting purposes, but soon spread through the country as a carnivorous pest

hunting native animals. They are intelligent creatures, said to be a mix in temperament

between a dog and a cat and domesticable16, but these strangers in the land are rarely

mourned as roadkill and can be legally killed. I upholstered the rocking chairs in fabric

printed with gum leaves (fig 48), emblematic of Australian flora, to locate the work and

15 The Animals of Farthing Wood, European Broadcasting Union (United Kingdom: BBC, 1993-‐1995) Television show. 16 Evan Ratliff “Taming the Wild”, National Geographic 219:3 (2011) 32, accessed March 20, 2015. http://ngm.nationalgeographic.com/2011/03/taming-‐wild-‐animals/ratliff-‐text/1


increase these tensions.

Two taxidermy artists whose work contributed to my formal choices include Rod Mcrae (fig

49), whose active tableau refers to overlap between foxes and urban spaces and questions

which species’ population is out of control17, and Polly Morgan (fig 50) who also uses

domestic objects coupled with seemingly slumbering foxes to allow the viewer thoughtful

reflection on our relationship with them.

Working with the fox hides has been the most difficult part of this Honours journey. With

each work, awareness of my own hypocrisy and the power of the perceptual dissonance has

heightened. When the hides arrived in the mail it occurred to me that they were the only

ones with faces. Soft and red, with eyeless faces staring hollowly at me, I had to put them

aside for a month before I could touch them (fig 51). The keeping of the face in the flattened

form speaks of human pride in the death of a cunning wild animal, unlike the docile cow,

sheep or rabbit which offer no glory. A trophy. I felt deeply ashamed. Over time I developed

a stronger affection for the foxes, they reminded me of one of my pets, so soaking their

underside in oil and scrubbing at the sinewy skin to try and soften them was distressing. I

washed, dried and brushed them, and the oil that still clung to the fur made them look

unhealthy, more as they are: the skins of dead animals.

I was reminded of the work of Angela Singer, who through her art collects animal trophies

and reinvents them into objects of pain and human shame. She wants to give back power to

the wronged creature.18 Sometimes the animal is decorated beautifully, sometimes as a

reminder of the trauma of it’s death, though often it’s both at once. (fig 52, 53 & 54).

Influenced by her work, I decided not to seek perfection in the foxes’ forms. They are

animals that have been shot, skinned and flattened to be turned into human objects. Some

of this trauma needs to be present in my final work.

I originally wanted to stain the rocking chairs a natural colour, but after stripping away the

17 “Operation Foxtrot”, Rod Mcrae, accessed 6 September, 2015, http://rodmcrae.com.au/operationfoxtrot.html 18 Aloi, Art and Animals, 42


paint realised they had been cobbled together from various types of wood and composite

materials. Not wanting to take from the foxes as focal points, I chose to colour match semi-‐

gloss acrylic paint to the background colour of the fabric (fig 55). Testing this colour, I found

that it was too washed out and not typical of common furniture. I chose a light olive green

taken from one of the gum leaves, instead. The fabric is attached over synthetic padding,

using tacks I upholstered in the same fabric. The seat has been nailed down at the centre to

create a depression and sense of weight under the fox forms.

Each fox is curled up on its chair, as if resting, with its back to the viewer. I took inspiration

from Morgan’s fox form protectively curled up in a glass (fig 50). Moving closer, a mask-‐like

empty face comes into view (fig 56): reminding us that this is the skin of a dead animal

simply given crude form. Their armatures were made in the same way as the rabbits’, with

galvanised wire, chicken wire, synthetic stuffing and fabric, but with more weight down the

spine (fig 57, 58 & 59). The hides were stitched onto the armatures and then onto the chair

upholstery.

Rocking slowly back and forth on their chairs in sync with each other, the foxes are given a

semblance of life not through ‘breath’ or warmth, but displaced motion. I achieved this

motion by reworking the last version of my mechanical design from the cow form. The

chairs sit on a raised platform that conceals a strong 50kg/cm2 torque low speed 55rpm

motor with a cleanly bent double-‐cam stainless steel rod attached. As the motor rotates,

they push and pull two more rods connected to the backs of the chairs through small holes.

Rubber and wool insulation absorbs and muffles the sound of the motor. The final result

gives an eerie semblance of life to the two foxes, connected through their synced motion

reminiscent of breath or heartbeats. The foxes and the chairs become single objects.

As none of my other works involved plinths, and because a plinth in this work would

distance the viewer emotionally, I had to consider what would be appropriate to use in the

work to raise the chairs and conceal the mechanical elements. It’s archetypally Australian to

have rocking chairs on a wooden deck, so I sourced used decking and built a small deck

reminiscent of that used in Amanda Stuart’s series of dog sculptures (fig 60). More than a

technical element, the deck further frames the work and heightens the tension between


animal we can empathise with and killable pest within Australian culture.

This final work is successful in giving sculptural presence to my conflicting notions of non-‐

human animals (fig 61). The choices I made, led by my heightened levels of perceptual

dissonance and awareness of my own hypocrisy, have resulted in a more confronting work

than those before it. The face and round form evokes empathy, but the emptiness

simultaneously pushes the viewer away. The slick fur is a reminder of illness and death: a

creature uncared for. The semblance of life dislocated from the body and given to the chair

denies the fox complete agency. While the physical framing within an archetypal Australian

scene of rocking chairs on a deck and the native gum prints further increases the tension

between perceptions of the fox as an animal to empathise with and a pest.


Conclusion After my year of research, and through progressive questions, my body of work finally

flourished from:

‘How can I give sculptural presence to my conflicting perceptions of non-‐human

animals and the resulting sensation of perceptual dissonance?’

I feel my work creatively engaged with this question, but also gave validity to the former,

through the use of sculptural devices in the reformed bodies of a cow, sheep, rabbits and

foxes. These included the reappropriation of commercial hides and skins to give tangible

presence to the conflicting perceptions of certain non-‐human animals. I found that the use

of household furniture created a psychological and bodily connection with the viewer. This

connection was further amplified by simple electronics that create a semblance of life

within the sculptural forms through the simulation of breath and movement or by offering

warmth.

It’s my hope that through this body of work, viewers will be driven to question the validity

of their own respective perceptions relating to non-‐human animals. By giving physical

presence to such perceptions, the resulting works demonstrate the constructed nature of

human understanding. I believe it is through this emotional engagement, art can provoke

new ways of thinking about non-‐human animals.

This year so far I feel I have grown significantly as an artist not just through an expanded

technical skills base, but importantly in my conceptual abilities. Furthermore, my continual

interrogations into my practice have challenged my ongoing interactions with other animals.

The resulting works are semi-‐autobiographical, and through careful consideration and

construction these objects have become their own questioning entities. Subsequently, I feel

my body of work purposefully answer my research question through both its sculptural

presence and the embodied hypocrisy of its taxidermy construction.


Bibliography

Giovanni Aloi, ed., Art and Animals: Art and Series (New York, USA: Tauris, 2012).

Steve Baker, Postmodern Animal: Essays in Art and Culture (London, UK: Reaktion Books, 2000).

Steve Baker "Something’s Gone Wrong Again", Antenna 7 (2008): 4-‐10, accessed July 15, 2015. http://www.antennae.org.uk/back-‐issues-‐2008/4583459061

Steve Baker, Artist Animal (Minneapolis, USA: The University of Minnesota Press, 2013).

L’Age d’Or. Directed by Luis Bunuel. Performed by Gaston Modot, Lya Lys, Max Ernst (France: Corinth Films, 1930) Film.

Lorraine Daston and Gregg Mitman, Thinking with Animals: New Perspectives on Anthropomorphism (New York, USA: Columbia University Press, 2005).

Jenny, Diski What I Don't Know About Animals (New Haven, CT, USA: Yale University Press, 2011).

The Animals of Farthing Wood, European Broadcasting Union (United Kingdom: BBC, 1993-‐1995) Television show.

Janet Rankin and Rebecca Selleck “Tracing Steps.” The Front Gallery and Café: 1 Wattle Pl, Lyneham ACT 2602. 19 August, 2015.

Evan Ratliff “Taming the Wild”, National Geographic 219:3 (2011) 32, accessed March 20, 2015. http://ngm.nationalgeographic.com/2011/03/taming-‐wild-‐animals/ratliff-‐text/1

Nigel Rothfels, ed., Representing Animals (Indiana, USA: Indiana University Press, 2002).


Other Reading

Gabriella Airenti, The Cognitive Bases of Anthropomorphism: From Relatedness to Empathy International Journal of Social Robotics 7:1 (2015) 10.

Susan J. Armstrong and Richard G. Botzler, ed., The Animal Ethics Reader. Second Edition edition (New York, USA: Routledge, 2008).

Steve Baker, Picturing the Beast: Animals, Identity and Representation (Manchester, UK: Manchester University Press, 1993).

Ian Bogost, Alien Phenomenology or What It's Like to Be a Thing (Minnesota, USA: University of Minnesota Press, 2012).

John Cacioppo, Nicholas Epley and Adam Waytz, Who Sees Human? The Stability and Importance of Individual Differences in Anthropormorphism Perspectives on Psychological Science 5:3 (2010): 13.

John Cacioppo, Nicholas Epley and Adam Waytz, Social Cognition Unbound: Insights into Anthropomorphism and Dehumanization Current Directions in Psychological Science 19:1 (2010): 4.

A.C. Dockes and F Kling-‐Eveillard, Farmers' and Advisers' Representations of Animals and Animal Welfare Livestock Science 103 (2006): 5.

Quanta Gault, Empathy Beyond Human: Interactivity and Kinetic Art in the Context of a Global Crisis Technoetic Arts: A Journal of Speculative Research 12:2 (2014): 9.

Michael Lundblad, The Animal Question American Quarterly 56:4 (2004): 9.

Catrin Misselhorn, "Empathy with Inanimate Objects and the Uncanny Valley." Minds and Machines 19:3 (2009): 14.


Matthew T Powell, Bestial Representations of Otherness: Kafka's Animal Stories Journal of Modern Literature 32:1 (2008): 13.

SaatchiGallery, Berlinde De Bruyckere http://www.saatchigallery.com/artists/berlinde_debruyckere_articles.htm.

Nicole Shukin, Animal Capital: Rendering Life in Bioplotical Times (Minnesota, USA: The University of Minnesota Press, 2009).

Nato Thompson, Becoming Animal: Contemporary Art in the Animal Kingdom (Cambridge, Massachusetts: The MIT Press, 2005)

Frank A.M Tuyttens, Filiep Vanhonacker, Wim Verbeke and Else Van Poucke, Do Citizens and Farmers Interpret the Concept of Farm Animal Welfare Differently? Livestock Science 116 (2008): 10.

Cary Wolfe, Before the Law: Humans and Other Animals in a Biopolitical Frame (Chicago, USA: The University of Chicago Press, 2013).

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Perceptual Dissonance

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