SCULPTURES THAT CLASP A GAZE
The moment people come across her work, they are left speechless and sometimes even scared because each of her sculptures are so, life-like. She defines herself as an artist who creates art that explores the human-animal relationship. Besides that Angela Singer is also an animal rights activist who is concerned about depicting living animals in different art-forms. “I often use vintage taxidermy animals and birds in my art. None of the taxidermy I use is taxidermied for or by me. I have never harmed nor killed, nor had any living creature harmed or killed, for my art”, confesses Angela. In a special conversation with A.Kameshwari from One World News, she shares more about her art.
You were a part of an animal rights group, how did your inclination towards art take place?
Some of my earliest and happiest childhood memories are of drawing with crayons on the butcher’s wrapping paper and hours spent sitting on the floor talking to our family dog. Art and animals have always been quite central in my life.
How has been your journey so far?
For almost twenty years, through my art, I have been exploring our ethical and moral approach towards animals. Exploitation of non-human living beings by humans is an issue which I continue to find ways to express through my art.
Your sculptures seem to be very realistic, how do you make them?
I use my old vintage taxidermy and mixed media. Buttons, wax, jewels and polyester clay are used to represent blood, flesh and various animal forms.
What all themes have you covered till now?
“I am concerned with how humans use and abuse animals to cause animal suffering. I believe that artists have a role to play in raising awareness of the exploitation, domination and torture of animals. Over the past 20 years I have seldom made art that does not include some form of animal representation.”
What are your upcoming projects?
I am currently exhibiting my art in an exhibition Ecce Animalia at the Museum of Contemporary Sculpture, Poland. Moreover, I am also working on artworks for an exhibition at The National Museum of Animals and Society, Los Angeles in May next year.
How difficult was it to start-up something like this?
When I first began to open up and strip back vintage taxidermy, I did not realise that I would expose bullet and shot wounds and knife cuts. It’s unsettling to make visible evidence of the aggression inflicted on the animals.
Share some of your most memorable moments?
The first time I advertised in a newspaper for vintage taxidermy, I was contacted by a former hunter. He donated to me all the animals he had killed & taxidermied and shared with me the history of each killing. That was a strange experience. Sitting in his kitchen, surrounded by taxidermy, taking notes like I was a police officer taking down facts about multiple murders.
How do people react towards your sculptures?
It depends on the artwork. Some of my artwork is beautiful and some is deliberately not beautiful. People have found my red wax works & red button works frightening and are drawn to look yet, repelled by them. Whereas, people have found my jewelled works beautiful; they are physically drawn-in to look more closely.
What is the message you want to spread through your art-form?
The basic message in my art-work is to raise awareness among people about the cruelty of humans on non-human living species. To think and question, how humans use and exploit animals?
About the Artist
For the past 20 years, Angela Singer’s art has explored the human-animal relationship. She is concerned with the ethical and epistemological consequences of humans using nonhuman life; with the role that humans play in the exploitation and destruction of animals and our environment. She sees the boundaries separating other species from humans as permeable. Her art invites a new way of seeing and thinking about the animal.
In some of her art she aims to turn taxidermic meaning. Combining mixed-media with “recycled” vintage discarded taxidermy, she incorporates into the look of her work some of the history of the death of the animal. She is not a taxidermist. She has never had a living creature taxidermied for her art. She has never had a living creature killed or harmed for her art. She will not use living creatures in her art.
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