Tessa Farmer. Photograph by Mark Pilkington
It's Thursday evening, the 'Miniature World' Show is about to open in the Jerwood Space in London, and Tessa Farmer, one of the participating artists, is discussing the exquisite little creatures she calls 'my fairies'.
Whilst most people might imagine fairies to be dainty, kindly beings that exchange money for teeth or at worst poke fun and wreak havoc like mischievous Puck in 'A Midsummer's Night Dream', or the petulant Tinkerbell in Peter Pan, Farmer's creations are decidedly wicked.
With their grinning skulls, insect-winged frames formed from dark roots and their love for debauchery, the little fellows are clearly on the lookout for trouble. I ask Farmer - whom it must be noted seems far too gentle, shy and sweet-looking to be the creator of such monsters - whether the fairies are straight out of hell. She looks both amused and bemused at the question: 'I'm not sure. I mean maybe they are. Ooh, I hope they're not from my mind. I just know they're evil and they keep getting more evil. They're evolving independently and their behaviour is based on how insects act.' She laughs: 'They're stealing ideas from the bugs and torturing and abusing and eating them.'
Anyone who's watched a nature documentary on insects will know that of all the animals in the natural world, insects are the most perverse and ingenious of creatures - from the deception, entrapment and paralysis of their prey, to the devouring of their mates post coitus and the wonder of their labyrinthine homes, they revolt and inspire in almost equal measure.
Farmer confesses that some of the more revolting aspects of nature hold the greatest fascination for her. She's been making her fairies for seven years - their skeletal bodies, half human, half insect, came about as a response to the anatomy course she was obliged to take whilst a student at The Ruskin School of Drawing and Fine Art, Oxford University. Every Wednesday morning during the first year of their three-year course, students would spend the morning drawing the life model and the skeleton, and the afternoon in the University's dissection room with cadavers.
It was a strange, unnerving experience for Farmer. 'I hated it at first. I hated having to draw the skeleton and the smell of the dissection room. And then fascination took over and I began to love the skeleton. It's amazing to see how things are built, how they fit together. And I began to imagine all sorts of strange creatures. I've always been fascinated by the social structure of animals. Think about termites and the power that they have, and their apparent sophistication - they're amazing.'
Farmer's dedication to making her strange, hybrid creatures has meant that she's become increasingly knowledgeable about the insect kingdom, and also about the physiognomy of small animals. A vet friend has been supplying her with small animal road kills - such as hedgehogs - which she buries in her mother's garden in Birmingham (not having her own garden in London where she lives and works) and lovingly refers to as 'the little patch of death in the corner'. Several months later she digs up the carcasses to retrieve the bones. Alternatively, with small creatures, such as birds, Farmer puts their bodies in jars of water, thus allowing a process of maceration to develop which enables the easy removal of the skeleton. Farmer then uses the bones to create macabre and fantastical flying vessels for her fairies.
Famer is careful to stress that she doesn't enjoy the gruesome process that begets these ivory halls of hell: 'I don't like rotting down these animals, but it's fascinating to see how they're built and this overrides the disgust. I mean it smells and it's not nice, and sometimes it's really sad. I had a leg bone of a hedgehog once that had a metal pin in it. Obviously it had been mended once before then gone and got itself run over - the pin in its leg somehow made the fragility of life more poignant.'
Farmer's fairies have recently begun to decrease in size. She wanted to make them and their wild actions more believable and felt that if they became insect-size they'd work better. I suggest that working with objects this size must be extremely difficult and require huge amounts of patience. Farmer responds modestly: 'Oh, I've just had plenty of practice.' But her skill is only too apparent in the tiny attentions to detail such as the miniscule rib cages and perfectly formed pelvises and the little touches of dark humour. Some of her fairies are surfing on shield bugs and damsel flies or engaged in wrestling matches with ants, the more evil of the fairy species making them walk the tightrope.
The wonder of Farmer's macabre, miniature world is even more incredible to behold after she reveals that she never uses a magnifying glass to help her produce her fantastically intricate creatures. The inspiration for their antics and habitat is drawn first from the insect kingdom, but also from the writings of Richard Doyle and the 16th-century poetry of Michael Drayton - most notably his 'Nymphidia'.
Farmer clearly revels in her fantastical world, and she's drawing in fans from the most unexpectedly material of places. She confides: 'Next week I have to go to Belgium to set up an installation for Mimi and Filiep Libeert (the president of Euratex - the European Apparel and Textile Organisation). He thought it would be fun to have me installing during a business meeting.'
Tessa Farmer is represented in London by Madder Rose Gallery. Jane Neal
Jane Neal is an Oxford-based freelance journalist and critic. Her special focus over the past year has been the developing art scene in Central and Eastern Europe. She contributes to a wide variety of international art publications.
'The Miniature World Show'
Until 9 September
Jerwood Space
171 Union Street
London SE1 0LN
Open Monday - Saturday 10am - 5pm
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