Bears and Stags

I wanted to challenge my ability to make recognisable animal shapes that would be likely more complicated than the shark from straws. These bear cubs proved to be a lot more complicated. Similar to the shark I picked a photo reference to figure out limbs and shapes and then I started from the head down figuring it out as I went along. To say next to no planning is ever in place for my sculptures, I am fairly happy with the outcome, especially the second bear clinging on to the plinth as it successfully holds itself. I wanted the cubs to have a bit of life and playfulness to them and not just look like bear statues but as if they are interacting with each other like the real deal they are supposed to represent. In this respect I'm sure I could make improvements by trying a bigger series of bears in different stances, or even adding animated qualities to the sculptures themselves as a possible future development.

After being asked "have you watched the Revenant?" by many people who caught me wandering the building with my bear paintings, I decided to give it a watch and now these bear cubs only remind me of that film. After the dramatic bear scene in which DiCaprio would have never realistically stood a chance but I suppose he wouldn't have won an oscar for twenty minutes of a film, it cuts to two bear cubs now on their own. Even though its just a film with CGI bears this all annoyed me, as it reminded me of how the death of a female bear guarantees the death of her cubs and on a more serious note is a huge issue with black bear hunting. Although it is supposed to be illegal to shoot a female bear at the time of year she is likely to be raising cubs, its highly unlikely a hunter will inspect the gender of a bear before taking aim.

Still on the theme of hunting, I created this stag piece designed with the intention to come out of a wall like the pictures shown. When experimenting with sculpture I became interested in different ways I could display my work, in which I have tried suspension, compositions on plinths and now this style. The deer is based off a trophy head idea but plus the legs and body making it less of a dead object classically representing some form of dominance over the hunted animal and more of an animated, fun object. The overall look is more goofy and comical than the classic elegant, noble stag depiction I set out with in my head, but I actually don't mind the outcome. The flexibility of the straws add a bit of bounce to the sculpture, possibly adding to the animated quality, however with the size and complicated shapes the straws proved a difficult material to work with as they weren't proving durable enough and have put me off attempting antlers for the foreseeable future. In future, for larger and more complex structures I am thinking of other materials more suitable or something I can add to the straw skeleton to fix this problem.