This is part of a series of works I’ve done using an old collaged portrait of my ex-husband James.
It went through several iterations – I wanted to do something similar to the dresses work, where the concertina formed a carousel. But when I made the houses, they leant too much.
First iteration was just houses.
Second iteration I added a second concertina and more houses
Third iteration I added “trees”, made from Japanese Pattern Sourcebook. These ones are supposedly lotus blossoms, but I cut them off to look tree-like.
Four iteration I added one more concertina and then I found a book to house it in.
So this is basically a maquette which may never be anything more than a maquette (which is how I think of all of my works now – it stops me being precious, and allows me maximum playfulness.
The book is no longer a carousel, it’s more of a pull-out I guess, because the houses still lean weirdly if gathered together (in retrospect the dresses did too, but they were smaller, so it wasn’t as obvious).
Here are some in progress pix and some “final” shots
