Tuesday, May 28, 2013

Wax Wounds! Victorian Memorial Hair Jewelry! Bat Skeletons in Glass Domes! London Based Workshops in Arcane and Anatomical Arts at London's Last Tuesday Society Beginning This Sunday, June 2


Morbid Anatomy is delighted to be bringing some of the best of our Morbid Anatomy Art Academy from Brooklyn to the rainy climes of London, with a series of workshops and classes in the arcane and the anatomical to be held at London's Last Tuesday Society.

Fancy learning the art of realistic wax wounds with unrivaled anatomical artist Eleanor Crook (see above; this Sunday, June 2)? Or perhaps you'd rather learn the art of Victorian Memorial Hair Jewelry (14th, 15th, and 16th June) with master jeweler and art historian Karen Bachmann? If that does not suit, perhaps you might enjoy articulating a real bat skeleton and posing it in a habitat of your own fashioning within a glass dome (29th June and 30th June) under the tutelage of Wilder Duncan, formerly of Evolution Store, the famous natural history emporium of New York City?

Full details on all workshops follow; Hope to see you at one or more!

Image: Bubonic Plague by workshop teacher Eleanor Crook
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Wax Wound Workshop with medical artist Eleanor Crook (Image above)
2nd June 2013
1 to 5pm
Ticket price £120 - all materials included
Location: The Last Tuesday Society at 11 Mare Street, London, E8 4RP map here)
*** Tickets can be purchased by clicking here

Let acclaimed sculptor Eleanor Crook guide you in creating your very own wax wound. Crook has lent her experience to professionals ranging from forensic law enforcement officers to plastic surgeons, so is well placed to help you make a horrendously lifelike scar, boil or blister.

Eleanor Crook trained in sculpture at Central St Martins and the Royal Academy and makes figures and effigies in wax, carved wood and lifelike media. She has also made a special study of anatomy and has sculpted anatomical and pathological waxworks for the Gordon Museum of Pathology at Guy's Hospital, London's Science Museum, and the Royal College of Surgeons of England. She exhibits internationally in both fine art and science museum contexts. In the interest of making figures more lifelike than the living, using a generous grant from the Wellcome Trust she developed the incorporation of electronic animatronics systems into the sculptures so that her moribund and macabre creations now can twitch and mutter. She is artist in residence at the Gordon Museum of Pathology, a member of the Medical Artists' Association, runs a course in Anatomy drawing at the Royal College of Art and lectures on the M. A. Art and Science course at Central St Martins School of Art in London.

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Hair Art Workshop Class: The Victorian Art of Memorial Hair Jewellery With Karen Bachmann
14th, 15th, and 16th June 2013
1 - 5pm
Ticket price £50 - all materials except for hair included
Location: The Last Tuesday Society at 11 Mare Street, London, E8 4RP map here)
*** Tickets can be purchased by clicking here (14th June), here (15th June), and here (16th June)

Hair jewellery was an enormously popular form of commemorative art that began in the late 17th century and reached its zenith during the Victorian Era. Hair, either of someone living or deceased, was encased in metal lockers or woven to enshrine the human relic of a loved one. This class will explore a modern take on the genre. The technique of "palette working" or arranging hair in artful swoops and curls will be explored and a variety of ribbons, beads, wire and imagery of mourning iconography will be supplied for potential inclusion. A living or deceased person or pet may be commemorated in this manner. Students are requested to bring with them to class their own hair, fur, or feathers; all other necessary materials will be supplied. Hair can be self-cut, sourced from barber shops or hair salons (who are usually happy to provide you with swept up hair), from beauty supply shops (hair is sold as extensions), or from wig suppliers. Students will leave class with their own piece of hair jewelry and the knowledge to create future projects. 

Karen Bachmann is a fine jeweler with over 25 years experience, including several years on staff as a master jeweler at Tiffany and Co. She is a Professor in the Jewelry Design Dept at Fashion Institute of Technology as well as the School of Art and Design at Pratt Institute. She has recently completed her MA in Art History at SUNY Purchase with a thesis entitled “Hairy Secrets; Human Relic as Memory Object in Victorian Mourning Jewelry”. In her downtime she enjoys collecting biological specimens, amateur taxidermy and punk rock.

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Bat in Glass Dome Workshop: With Wilder Duncan (formerly of Evolution Store, Soho)
29th June and 30th June 2013
1 to 5pm
Ticket price £150 - all materials included
Location: The Last Tuesday Society at 11 Mare Street, London, E8 4RP map here)
*** Tickets can be purchased by clicking here (29th June) and here (30th June)

In this class, students will learn how to create an osteological preparation of a bat in the fashion of 19th century zoological displays. A bat skeleton, a glass dome, branches, glue, tools, and all necessary materials will be provided for each student, but one should feel welcome to bring small feathers, stones, dried flowers, dead insects, natural elements, or any other materials s/he might wish to include in his/her composition. Students will leave the class with a visually striking, fully articulated, “lifelike” bat skeleton posed in a 10” tall glass dome. This piece can, in conjunction with the other creations in the DIY Wunderkammer workshop series, act as the beginning of a genuine collection of curiosities! This class is part of the DIY Wunderkammer workshop series, curated by Laetitia Barbier and Wilder Duncan for Morbid Anatomy as a creative and pluridisciplinary exploration of the Curiosity Cabinet. The classes will focus on teaching ancient methods of specimen preparation that link science with art: students will create compositions involving natural elements and, according to their taste, will compose a traditional Victorian environment or a modern display. More on the series can be found here.

Wilder Duncan is an artist whose work puts a modern-day spin on the genre of Vanitas still life. Although formally trained as a realist painter at Wesleyan University, he has had a lifelong passion for, and interest in, natural history. Self-taught rogue taxidermist and professional specimen preparator, Wilder worked for several years at The Evolution Store creating, repairing, and restoring objects of natural historical interest such as taxidermy, fossils, seashells, minerals, insects, tribal sculptures, and articulated skeletons both animal and human. Wilder continues to do work for private collectors, giving a new life to old mounts, and new smiles to toothless skulls.

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