#emily unsworth white

This is a picture from my big hand in the other day. I am so thrilled with how it went, one year down!!

pretty-corny:

emilyissleepy:

Delicate soul (part 2)

I really enjoyed making these, i hope you enjoy looking at them just as much <3

wooooooow

I can’t believe how many notes this has, i think i’m actually going to cry! Thank you so much everyone!

i just finished this piece ‘Who’s For Dinner?’

i hope you like it!

Delicate soul (part 2)

I really enjoyed making these, i hope you enjoy looking at them just as much <3

Something i did a while ago

delicate soul 

This piece was based on the idea that your hair is the flowers of your personality. My sister is beautiful.

This is my most recent final piece, on the topic of subversion. 

Please, please, please for the love of everything good, don’t remove the source. This is my work and i am proud of it. Also sharing would make you the best person in my eyes.

Please, please, please for the love of everything good, don’t remove the source. This is my work and i am proud of it. Also sharing would make you the best person in my eyes.

A beautiful accident, i love the way the letters peer through the petals.

Please, please, please for the love of everything good, don’t remove the source. This is my work and i am proud of it. Also sharing would make you the best person in my eyes.

Tums Instead Of Buns

The last couple of rats that I have skinned I have begun with the belly instead of the back. When I first began taxidermy, I followed a manual that told be to start from the belly, but I had seen other tutorials that started from the back and I thought those looked easier (when you start from the back the spine and ribs protect all the organs from any slips with the knife). But now I am more experienced I felt comfortable trying out the other way.

I found the skin on the belly a lot easer to cut, it seemed thinner and a lot stretchier. It’s hard to say whether this way was easier or not, I think because it was new to me I found it a lot more exciting but I’m sure that will fade fast. I did find the tail a little harder to do but I think the main body was a lot easier because I was working towards spine and ribs rather than the soft belly, which meant I was tougher and faster.

When it came to the stuffing I did find the change in entry point easier. It was a little confusing to begin with as I had to stuff in an opposite direction but once I got the hang of it, I feel that it sped the whole process up a lot. It also made the sewing up a lot more pleasant, this was always one of my least favourite stages, but the skin was a lot thinner making is sooooo much easier to see through and the position was a lot more versatile.

Finally, the appearance of the rats when completed has improved so much! The slight fuzzy, sewn edge you can see on the yellow rats back is now hidden on the purple and pink ones, success!

I will definitely continue skinning the rats in this way, at least for the curled up rats, as it improves the appearance so much. I feel like I am slowly getting better at better at this, I’m excited for what’s to come next!

The Rats Are Taking Over 

The rat I was skinning a few weeks ago had a huuuuuuuuuuuge poop coming out of its bum (yes, I guess the rumour that you poo yourself when you die is true!) and me thinking it was totally hilarious had a photo taken with it.

But seriously, rats are taking over my life. I’ve been thinking about them constantly and have even dreamed about them loads. I had one dream where all the rats I stuffed came back to life and they could talk and they were all bright colours, which was pretty fun. I feel that that dream in particular boosts my belief about reincarnating the rats into a higher being and ridding them of their mortal bodies.

Maybe I’ll turn into a crazy rat lady, but hey maybe I already am one.

I Can’t Be Stopped

I’ve only gone and done another one. This is the fourth out of the little sleepy circle rats, meaning only 8 more to go! Once I have 12 I can mount them on my canvas’s ready for the exhibition, what fun.

I used the ‘Apple green’ dye at an attempt to create a green rat. I had not used this dye before so I was unsure what to expect but the dye colour in gunge form was very emerald green so I expected it to
Be quite dark. The colour that has come out is very similar to the lagoon blue, just a little bit more greeny. The colour has come out beautifully on the tail though and I’m sure I could create a more intense colour with a few more coats!

Production Line

A few weeks ago had two skinned rats ready to become immortal and I felt dangerous, so I thought hey, let’s do them all today! Usually it takes about three hours to stuff a rat after the skinning stage and I managed to get this down to two, having done two in four hours!

I decided to dye one of the rats ‘sunset’ colours (yellow and pink) to go with the midnight rat and the other one I decided to try out my new orange dye. Here you can see them looking very deflated and spooning.

The sunset rat was a great success, the colours came out perfectly and I didn’t need to redo them at all! The stuffing was very quick and easy, I think I’m really getting the hang of it.

And look how perfect it looks with the midnight rat! I stuffed it on the same side so that when I mound them on the canvas they can face each other like this with their tails curling in different directions. Perfect.

Im also happy with how the yellow rat turned out! I would say more of a duckling colour, but still very cute and I think the tail is quite obviously orange, it could maybe be left of for longer or mixed with a bit of red for a more orangey tone? There is also a strange story behind this rat. I skinned it on Halloween and I am sure it is possessed! When I was skinning it I realised its ears and little rat balls were very hard (they are usually soft) and when I skinned it’s eyelid it had a very creepy, hard, white eye (usually red and jelly like). It could of had something to do with being refrozen too much but I’m definitely going to go with possessed.

But overall a very productive day, I hope there are many more to come!

Reincarnation and Respect

I read this book ‘The Incarnations’ recently and I absolutely loved it. It’s all about reincarnation and old souls, something I’m very interested in. I don’t know a huge amount about reincarnation, I briefly looked at it when I was taught religion when I was younger, but the mention of it grabs my attention. I am not a religious person but once had an ‘epiphany’ like dream that was all to do with reincarnation, so I am always fascinated to hear about it.

I kinda like to think that I am reincarnating my rats into new beings. I am turning them into beautiful, immortal rat gods, ridding them of their rotting body and giving them a new sterile one, which will last forever.

I have been thinking about ways to make the stuffing of my rats more ritualistic and meaningful, perhaps even like an Egyptian mummy, the rats could contain artefacts to take them to the netherworld. My first thought was herbs and spices, I could fill the new, clean body with beautiful smells that also come with meaning. I could also use more natural materials for the stuffing such as fine straw. All these things I will need to research up on in order to carry out a more powerful practice.

First ombre rat

I recently dyed my first ombre rat. I went for colours blue and purple (the midnight rat) but I was very unsure how it would turn out. The rat that is nailed to the wall in my previous blog is a prime example of the dyes often not coming out as you think. For that rat I used the same blue as I am using now and clearly it didn’t come out as dark as it should of. That is because the rats hair has a lot of natural oil on it that protects it from the conditioner, as well as it being difficult dying on white anyway. But when I dyed this rat I use a few techniques such as hair drying to make the colours more intense (making the dye warm helps it to hold in the hair), although I had never used the purple dye before so I wasn’t quite sure what I was working with.Here hes all wrapped up to dry in correct position and will have to stay like this for a few weeks. I’m really happy how the tail turned out, I thought id try out something new and I think it is very effective. I am thinking of putting this rat and maybe ½ others on my rectangle canvas in Damien hirst fashion, all with ombré dye and cornelian tails.The dyes also created some really interesting patterns on the inside of the skin. Here you can also see the contrast of the soft and pretty outside to the sticky, spongey inside.

There is a rat nailed to my wall

Whilst I was stuffing a rat to look very alike to the pink rat to go on my spot pieces, I stopped and held the rat to the wall. I was holding the rat by its scruff, as it’s mother would carry it and it’s half stuffed body fell in line. I imagined the harshness of a nail holding it there against its will and thought artists should follow their instincts, so why not!

To me at the moment, this piece speaks a lot about cruelty. As an outsider taking a first glance at this piece you would be shocked and horrified, unknowing that this is a preserved rat. But does that change anything?

Since I made my first cut in taxidermy I have felt a lot of respect for the animal. Rats are often a symbol of disease, hatred and disgust, but I have always felt the need to do a good job in order to not disrespect the animals body. I feel like this piece does quite the opposite. I have spent hours removing, washing, preserving and filling its skin to make it immortal, only to viciously nail it to my wall in a mockery of its inability to refuse.

Okay so I feel pretty bad right now but I feel that I have created a symbol. Despite the disrespect I have show this rat, I have also given it a power to influence.

In some sense I believe this piece could be looked at as religious. The dyed fur of the rat ups it’s status to something better than an ordinary rat, it is humanised, special, beautiful and possibly intelligent and you as a viewer feel more inclined to feel sorry for it because of this. That great big nail in it comes with a hole lot of meaning, ‘crucifying’ the rat to the wall.

I feel like this piece speaks a lot about human nature and our strong belief in our intelligence, over our unquestioned ruling and our confidence in ourselves as the top of the food chain. We are bully’s not only to the rest of the natural world but to each other and we are selfish. The origins of this rat body are a prime example of this. Rats are bred in captivity in order to feed pet snakes, and in the same way as I held the rat to the wall by its scruff as it’s mother would, the rats are cared for and nurtured then mindlessly and without love, murdered for the sake of our pets. The control of an organism for personal gain is selfish and brings my point full circle.

I have disrespected this animals body for you to see and for you to understand. Maybe you will laugh at it, maybe you will cry but most likely you will be filled with a sad feeling that something is very wrong here.

Pretty Gross

I was once skinning a rat and looked at the meat of the body and the colours in it and thought ‘isn’t that pretty’.

I love how in some places the colours are very cold and muted, whilst in others they are very warm and bright. It’s like this little guy has a galaxy inside him. Lesson on the day, everything is beautiful if you look hard enough.

A jolly visit to Tate Britain

I fell in love with some things.

Frank bowling ‘mirror’ 1966

Frances hodgkins ‘loveday and ann: two women with a bouquet of flowers’ 1915

Jon William Waterhouse ‘the lady of shalott’ 1888

John Everett Millais ‘Ophelia’ 1852

John singer Sargent ‘carnation, lily, lily, rose’ 1886

Lucien Freud ‘girl with a kitten’ 1947

Stanley spencer ‘double nude portrait: the artist and his second wife’ 1937

Gillian ayres ‘break off’ 1961

I love my postcards and I’m trying to love autumn, so here’s a little combo for your eyes.

John William Waterhouse ‘the lady of shalott’ 1888

Anselm Kiefer ‘winter Landscape’ 1970

J.M.W Turner ‘undine giving the ring to massaniello, fisherman of Naples 1846

Dot Procter ‘the orchard’ 1934

Bridget Riley ‘fall’ 1963

J.M.W Turner ‘the angel standing in the sun’ 1846

Lucien Freud ‘naked portrait’ 1972-3

John William Inchbold ‘at Bolton: the white doe of rhylstone’ 1855

Michael Andrews ‘Melanie and me swimming’ 1978-9

John singer Sargent ‘carnation, lily, lily, rose’ 1885-6