The delightful and the disastrous

I want to do a series of paintings that celebrate the beauty of human imperfection through the lens of homemade hedgehog cakes: well-intentioned creations that teeter between the delightful and the disastrous. My research images below capture the tension between aspiration and failure. They are delicious monuments to effort, love and the chaos of making. Sincerity outshines skill, and failure becomes its own kind of success.

Each painting could be a tender and hilarious portrait of human endeavour. And proof that failure, in all its lumpy beauty, is profoundly relatable and teaching.

Each painting could serve as a metaphor for human fallibility and the absurdity of creative aspiration. By translating these domestic mishaps into oil paint, a medium traditionally associated with mastery and reverence, the imperfections visible in the subject matter could be elevated further into a subject of study and affection. The subversion of the medium invites a consideration of what we value in making: perfection, or the attempt itself.

But what if they were fake oils, digital imitations of oil paintings, echoing the false versions of self so often curated online? I’m drawn to the tension between what’s made to look real and what’s actually honest in that idea. 

The feels like an opportunity to finally dive into Procreate on the iPad too. Maybe I could make a zine about it.