The mystery, strangeness, beauty and occasional grotesquery pervade the work of British textile artist Mister Finch. He describes himself thus: "Scraps of thread and fabric are stitched and pulled into fairy tale creatures looking for new owners and worlds to inhabit. Finch works alone and makes everything himself by hand in a studio full of books, glass jars and naughty cats." Michael Reynolds of Wallpaper notes another characteristic of Finch's work that also delights me, his connection to 19th century natural history specimen collectors and scientists, saying that Mister Finch "seems to have imagined quite a fantastic other reality, populated it, foraged it and has been good enough to share its spoils with us. Birds, insects, flora and fauna — all specimens that he has meticulously curated and fabricated with an almost Darwinian flair. Part modern day hipster, part Victorian dandy—Mister Finch has always struck me as an eccentric whose obsession with the natural world rivals that of his 19th-century counterparts." True, dat dat. In addition to his website, you can see his work on his Instagram and read about it and him in his book Finch: Living in a Fairy Tale World. The altered animal forms that pervade Mister Finch's work aren't to every taste, but they are definitely to mine.
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| Mister Finch, Florin |