Cabinet of Curiosities

I've started some research for my next project. The outline for my project is to explore and develop fabrication skills and techniques- in particular casting.

I thought i should run with a theme and so I'm going to take mermaids as a theme because I want to be able to develop making both animal and human puppets. Also i thought i could try out lots of textures to cast for fish tails and skin etc.

I would like to be able to present my work at the end of the year as an installation because its a form of art that i love and it is so much more interesting for the views to look at.

So i will be creating a Cabinet of Curiosities- Findings of MerFolk- and this should be an interesting way to  display my fabrication development.

"A cabinet of curiosities was an encyclopedic collection in Renaissance Europe of types of objects whose categorical boundaries were yet to be defined. They were also known by various names such as Cabinet of Wonder, and in German Kunstkammer or Wunderkammer (wonder-room). Modern terminology would categorize the objects included as belonging to natural history (sometimes faked), geology, ethnography, archaeology, religious or historical relics, works of art (including cabinet paintings) and antiquities. Besides the most famous and best documented cabinets of rulers and aristocrats, members of the merchant class and early practitioners of science in Europe also formed collections that were precursors to museums." Charmaine Zoe

A sunfish skeleton

A Victorian curiosty

Wooden prosthetic hands/ puppet hands

Charles Byrne, known as the Irish Giant, was the toast of Georgian London after arriving to seek his fortune at the age of 21 and being put on show as a freak.

A double bodied calf- possible a fake