Tracey Bush

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Paper

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The two herbarium sheet drawings are part of Tracey's ongoing "Nine Wild Plants" project, which was inspired by reading that the average Western adult can recognise more than 1,000 brands and logos, but less than 10 native wild plants.  The drawings are made from pressed "herbarium" specimens of common wild plants and are recreated in paper packaging cut from hundreds of brand names and logos.  The combination of austere black line and attention grabbing colours and type styles of packaging is compelling.  

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The collage is hand-cut with embroidery scissors in the same manner that Mary Delaney (1700-1788) created her "paper mosiaks" (many of which are in the British Museum).  The series interweaves a theme of lost knowledge (and species) with the rigour of scientific specimens.

 

Several works from the series were featured artworks in the 2016 exhibition "Of Green Leaf, Bird and Flower, Artists' Books and the natural World," (with catalogue) at the Yale Centre for British Art, USA.

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This year Tracey was shortlisted for the John Ruskin Prize with a paper sculpture on the theme "Agent of Change".