Mounds Brooches, 2009, NYC Pink Wax, Polystyrene Balls, Freshwater Pearls, Coral, 925 Silver, Cotton ThreadAs I have been sitting here updating the images of work made this year it occurred to me that I have not posted much writing about the project apart from my comments here on the blog. I have done a bit of writing about the work and asked two marvelous writers to contribute pieces to my exhibition catalogue. As I am posting so many images just now it is hard to think of something snappy to add, so here is an image (a detail of the exhibition installation at Craft Victoria) and some text by Debbie Pryor...
And I looked
At my big ball of string,
And I said,
NOW I will find
A thing of some kind –
Some GOOD kind of thing
To do with my string!1
When Marion Holland wrote my favourite children’s book, A Big Ball of String, she created a character (not surprisingly) obsessed with making the biggest ball of string he possibly could. He began to do everything a child could do with an incredibly long piece of string- fly balloons into the sun, construct a machine out of a bike, a trike and a toy jeep- until he was bedridden. Then he discovered he could do even more- he could rig up the entire contents of his room and continue playing without needing to leave his bed at all, all with one ginormous piece of string. But if only he had some pink wax and a few pearls…
In her self-assigned project Take a ball of thread… Melinda Young has set herself three fundamental rules: Make from the one industrial spool of pink thread until completely used. Only materials already in her studio can be sourced. Every item made must be wearable. These simple rules are reminiscent of Miranda July’s Learning to Love You More 2 project, such simple beginnings for pieces that ultimately represent very intimate concepts and experiences.
The works themselves pose questions about our notions of wearability/function (through use of materials) to wearability/classification of beauty (through the creation of alluringly grotesque forms). The curious bubbling piles look like chewed candy, or a discarded sun-melted plastic Barbie accessory, somehow finding its way into a gallery (or onto a lapel). The pieces harbour uncomfortable yet familiar feelings- candy pinks at once seduce and sweetly sicken, reminding us of childhood toys. Simultaneously, the works have a visceral quality, mimicking the body’s interiors. Linking them with our exterior, we are prompted to contemplate cultural attitudes and ideas about the abject and the female body.
I’ll be your plastic toy. 3
Debbie Pryor
Gallery Director, metalab
1. Marion Holland, A Big Ball of String, Random House Inc, 1958
2. www.learningtoloveyoumore.com
3. Just Like Honey, Jim Reid (Jesus and Mary Chain), 1985
