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Taxidermy Late at The Horniman Museum

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Within minutes of turning up waaaay too early, I'd managed to score myself an events pass, take over the dressing room and put my own work up inside the museum in the main performance space. Brilliant. Keep Away From Idiots My amazing pass with swipe action getting me anywhere I wanted to go...Which was mainly the bar. There he is! Smack back in the main game.  Polly morgan, Pat Morris and Errol Fuller were all there to talk too. Unfortunately the room was smashed full to the brim of bursting so all we could do was look through the glass window and make up hilarious voiceovers.     I would have liked to have said hello to Errol, he was the one who lent us loads of the big taxidermy pieces for  BORROWED TIME - the movie, but alas he was swamped. So instead I took my models for a wander through the museum. Hair and Make-up in my personal dressing room Making friends.... Model one wears a Chaffinch rescued out the mouth of

The Art world Genuinely Needs Me.

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After months and months of retirement, I've decided that the art world genuinely needs me. So I've started making progress with new work. Lets hope I don't get evicted before I've created millions of masterpieces. The council made a super surprise visit to the house today. I was happy I'd moved the rotting fox from the driveway but bricking it that they would wander into the garden and discover the open graves. There's a nice corner not that tucked away which I've been stock piling materials. . . Unless the council are blind and stupid, the definitely saw everything.  They definitely saw all the weird sculptures hanging around and they definitely saw what's lurking in the basement. As soon as I heard they were heading into the garden I mentally shat myself and pegged it. I've been evicted before and I wasn't ready to face the potentially impending fury. This eviction story is a story I haven't told many people apart from

Charlie Tuesday Gates does Fashion with Mind Like Magpie & Friends

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My assistant and life long muse Mr Wacko Jacko. Never seen anyone look so good in a Guillemot  I had to create a whole new world for a shoot. I say world but what I really mean is loads of great exciting new stuff for the fashion world. It was wonderful to have a reason to live and the reason could be as big and powerful as I wanted. The mood board was waved around digitally, and with each wonderful thing that passed my eyes, every beautiful ray of physical joy filled me with gleaming inspiration.  I set about making more exiting, more bling, more powerful creations. Left completely to my own devices... I could do what I want! Work in progress Canadian Goose wing necklace. Such a beautiful model. My assistant Mr Wacko Jacko   This headpiece wasn't actually for the shoot. It was just for me ;) A last minute gift to myself. Can be worn as headpiece or Necklace. Dog sold separately. www.mindlikemagpie.com www.facebook.com/mindlikem

So Much Bling I'm Blinded

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Here is my current crowing glory. Yes it's the headpiece to end all headpieces. Ram's skull covered in a magpies wet dream. I'm working on some new pieces for a fashion shoot. They showed me a mood board and asked me to come up with some stuff....  'Yeah'- I thought-' Like that- BUT BETTER.' So here's the current best of the best.  If I could be a thing right now THIS would be it. I am so in love. More in love than anything ever before.. When the light hits it, the celling goes wild- like the whole ocean is reflected in the walls.  It is just amazing.   Failing being a headpiece, I will turn it into a sculpture. A creature that gives out so much dazzling light you can't even look at it. Here's some other creations specifically for the shoot: Canadian Goose wing necklace. Still needs to be twiddled with but you've got the essence.  'The Guille' Guillemot headpiece. It's nice to work on nice things. In

Taxidermy Puppets!!!!! SING FOR YOUR LIFE!

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Recently I performed an excerpt from the musical  'SING FOR YOUR LIFE!' at the first Dark Fabrics Cabaret; A cross between the X Factor and Pet Rescue. In the week before I managed to scrape together a fox which was specially couriered up from my mum's freezer in Dorset. Poor woman..... This fox was found by my sister and her friend.  As you can see they're having a great time. The fox obviously hadn't. There wasn't a scratch on her which leads me to suspect poison!  She was a beauty.  So so stunning. Took at least 3 days to semi defrost. Here's how the puppet was made. . . . STEP ONE: Defrost Fox STEP 2: Skin Fox STEP 3: Try and make the fox look like a fox again To give the head a shape instead of just flopping around I used a badger skull. If I had a fox skull I would have used that but I didn't so a badger had to do. It's wider and shorter but by padding the skull out with sanitary towels, eventually it started to a