This week I found a great New Zealand artist called Hannah Kidd. I had never seen her work before and considering how popular she has become I was surprised I’d missed it. She has no relation to silver, her sculptures are actually made from recycled corrugated iron and steel rods.
Had her subject matter been described to me I’m not sure I would have visited her website, animals made from old tin roofing sounds all wrong to me! But when you see the work you realise there’s so much more to it than that.
I remember we had a lecturer in college who used to say:
There’s no such thing as tacky, if it’s executed well.
I was reminded of this when I saw Kidd’s work, not because I think the subject matter is tacky but I have visions of how different the work could look if it got into the wrong hands.
Thankfully Kidd’s are not the wrong hands. Each piece is executed with a remarkable level of detail and a subtly of character that is more than just a mimicking of the subject. The work sets up an amazing dialogue about the subject and their surroundings.
The pieces are made using flat tin which is spot welded onto the steel rods acting as the frame of the piece. I love the seems and joints that give each piece a individual character. I have no idea how she managed to capture that level of detail considering her raw materials and methods. I read in one article that all the iron comes from old roofing which she drives over with her four wheel drive to manipulate it into a flat workable form.
It’s lovely to see a poor piece of roofing metal being reincarnated into such beautiful objects.
I also found another artist Kitty Wales who’ s work is quite similar. Click here to go to her website.
