Prettybrilliant: hey what if

Half-baked ideas of a multi-maniacal bent; I have taken out my journals and shaken them onto the internet. Most of these projects lie outside the limits of what one person could (or would want to) realize in one lifetime, but I like them (even the stupid ones) and want to share them so they can have some other life. Ultimately, it is burdensome to have too many dreams (life is better for the goldfish if it is the only one in the bowl) so if I give some away perhaps the other ones will have more room to thrive.
Tue Mar 10

Deborah Butterfield vs. Pokey the Horse

Deborah Butterfield makes incredibly boring statues of horses.

Thay are all the same, bleakly commercial and 70’s-office-park looking, and every major sculpture collection in the US has one.

I can’t believe she passes for a major woman artist in the 21st century. I particularly hate the ones at the Portland Airport:

Why can’t we have a horse sculpture like the one at the Denver airport?

Now that’s art with balls. In this case literally.

Anyhow, my plan is to make a Deborah Butterfield horse, ideally nearly life size, out of pipe cleaners. I love pipecleaners and have made a bunch of stuff out of them; the most notable item being this one:

I just think they’re a great sculptural medium. They’re strong and pliable and linear like wire, but also fluffy and volumetric and colorful like yarn. You can start anywhere and work out in all directions, the threads will stay in place but you can also change and move them as you go along, and the softness and hardness of them makes them really enjoyable to work with. Their main constraint is that they usually come in dinky 1 foot lengths, which is really irritating. But lo! I have found an ebay seller who will do infinite yardage fresh from the factory in China. My cup runneth over.

So here’s my idea for MY horsie:

Hooray! It’s Pokey! Everyone’s favorite bendy stop-animation horse! I really like the idea of making Deborah Butterfield’s symbol of ruggedly majestic, aloof and permanent Manifest Destiny into an interactive, malleable and playful Gumby-beast… for is that not the great goodness of horses, that they are huge but they have soft hairs and do what you tell them to? You can make them dance and wear funny hats! Oh joy!

Anyhow, I figure I’ll probably need about 1000 yards of pipecleaner (or ‘chenille stem’ as we arts and crafts pros call it), so hopefully I can get a bulk discount… otherwise $1 a yard could kinda add up… sigh.