Mixed media 01: Queen of the Night in plaster and fimo

By 15th June 2008August 21st, 2018Blog

I really didn’t expect to enjoy working with plaster but in the interests of being experimental, had a go and was pleasantly surprised. This variety of plaster is actually something called “modrock”, which is plaster pre-powdered onto a roll of builder’s scrim. You cut it to shape, dip it in water, sloosh it around between your fingers and then slap it onto whatever you’re plastering. Usually, I suppose, that would be a wall. In this case it was a square of hardboard with the round rim of a yoghurt pot mounted to form a ring.

What’s nice about modrock compared to regular plaster is that you have longer to work with it. Each strip or piece of modrock sets up fairly quickly, but because each one is handled separately you have time to build up slowly. I found it quite satisfying, and could see myself building models with a proper wire armature underneath.

The inspiration for this piece is the Queen of the Night, an image I return to again and again. It is purely accidental that her hand is “flesh” coloured — that just happened to be the colour of the Fimo that I had that was pre-softened. (Fimo can be hard work to knead!) The real QotN is a lovely dark terracotta. I’m in two minds about whether or not to bake the Fimo. In theory, it will harden and become brittle on its own. And there’s a fine layer of plaster over it now anyway, so it might not matter. It’s not as if it is going to be handled.