Oodles of Doodles: New Model Kit Sculpture Design

Thursday, 26 May 2011

New Model Kit Sculpture Design

I’m currently working on some designs for a new series of wall-mounted low relief sculptures. Like my And When I’m a Man piece (which was made from 12 casts of my own body), these new works will be based upon the pre-assembled Airfix-style model kits that many of us used to make when we were kids – except that these new ones will be much smaller than my original life-sized one. For this project I will be working in collaboration with the on-line arts magazine, FAD and the California-base industrial designer, Noel Wilson.

And like my second model kit based sculpture, Baby Kit, which subverted the whole point of the model kit (as in that the sum of all its parts didn’t actually make a whole), the new series aims to do this a little more subtly by substituting just one element with something from an unrelated figure. In the case of this working drawing the right leg has been replaced with that Daffy Duck. In another design I have substituted the left arm with that of an octopus tentacle. That design, along with one based upon Leonardo da Vinci’s Vitruvian Man drawing can be seen on my other blog.

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Biog

Based in London since 1999, Chisnall now divides his time and art practice between London and his new, larger studio in Shropshire. Coming from an illustration, painting and print-making background he is now as well known for his sculptures and drawings.

In 2005 he was awarded a bursary and membership from the Royal British Society of Sculptors.

As well as his work appearing in UK and international exhibitions, magazines, on record covers, and on TV (including BBC 2's 'The Culture Show', Channel 4 News, London Live, and Channel 4's 'Four Rooms'), his sculptures have appeared in the feature film, 'Scratch', directed by Jakob Rørvik. In 2013 he was commissioned to produce a series of paintings for the horror film 'Bliaze of Gory'.

The artist's work is featured regularly in on-line articles and interviews, including two separate articles in The Huffington Post.

Chisnall has organised and run art/sculpture workshops for schools and businesses since 1998, including ones for ING Bank's London headquarters via the Royal British Society of Sculptors.

John Malkovich chose Chisnall's script, 'Doppelganger', as the winning entry in the 2008 Sony VAIO Scriptwriting competition. This script, along with Malkovich's was then turned into the short animated film, ‘Snow Angel’.

“ … I’m going to go with the “Doppelganger” script. It’s clever, inventive, and somehow both surprising and inevitable. Very neatly done all in all.” John Malkovich (4th Jan. 2008).

As well as working on his own projects the artist accepts commissions. His clients include Mary Fox Linton, Andy Martin Architects, Converse, Dawood and Tanner, Domus, Ctrl.Alt.Shift, private collectors, and the Ping Pong restaurant chain.

Artist's Statement

Much of my practice involves the reworking of found objects; objects that I feel have a certain ‘resonance’. By using materials already loaded with meaning and associations I am able to play with people’s expectations and create narratives that lurch between the humorous and the uncanny.

Memory, or its fallibility, is central to my work; as is evident in pieces that incorporate or recreate childhood artefacts. An important aspect of my life-size model kit sculpture, ‘And When I'm a Man, I’ll Think as a Man’, is its colour, which was chosen to match my memory of that of a childhood toy – realizing that the memory would have mutated; exaggerating its original luridness. In an age of fake news and phenomena such as the ‘Mandela Effect’ I’m eager to explore the creative possibilities of misremembering and of outright fabrication.

As well as the obvious sexual interpretation of the orifice element that's emerged in many of my recent works, my main interest in the device, lies in it being the portal between the internal and the external.

Other reoccurring motifs in my work are the box and tower; pertaining to themes of containment, the urge to possess, and mobility.

Although not a film maker myself, my work has been influenced by my early passion for film and animation. This is evident in my archaic-looking tower sculpture, ‘The City,’ which echoes the same fairy tale or dream-like quality that is characteristic of the short films of animators such as the Brothers Quay and Jan Švankmajer.

“Chisnall’s towering wooden piece is made up of tiny display cases and cabinets made from found materials like skulls, insects and fossils, a kind of modern cabinet of curiosities. Or a nightmarish vision inspired by Jorge Luis Borges. He explains that much like the inhabitants of a big city, each compartmentalised environment plays out its own narrative, seemingly oblivious to that of its neighbour”. Julia Kollewe (journalist – The Guardian & The Independent), 2009.

“Wayne Chisnall creates art that references such things as structure, time and Modernism as they pass through a very contemporary mindset that focuses on humor, transience, functionality and futility. There is also the presence of popular culture in his thinking, as he addresses the differences between reality and perception, and how that affects the needs, wants and even the formation of the human psyche.” D. Dominick Lambardi, 'Repurposing With a Passion', The Huffington Post, 14th July 2014.