Mourning, Monarchs and Hair Works


The artworks in this series continues the my exploration of the cultural attitudes that surrounded death, the body, and disease during the Victorian age, unveiled in several layers in a series of prints, objects, and sculptures. Large-format digital prints of dissected bodies from old Victorian anatomical atlases appear doubled, as if embodying ghosts. In Requiems, numerous butterfly wings are collaged onto the flat surfaces of marble obelisks and pyramids. In selecting to use delicate natural materials that allude to the tragically short lives of butterflies and the fragility of human existence, I refer to both the human fascination with nature, and the spectacles of both death and artistic creation. Hair works and collaged prints of British monarchs inspired by Victorian mourning rituals are the result of a lengthy artist residency at the Bytown Museum in Ottawa.