Francis Upritchard

Human Problems
Hari Kunzru, 2006
Hardcover 96 pages
Publisher: Kate MacGarry, London & Veenman Publishers, Rotterdam
ISBN: 9086900305
Dimensions: 26.04 x 19.05 x 1.27cm
Francis Upritchard takes thrift-store pots and remakes them as canopic urns, ancient Egyptian repositories for the organs of the dead; converts old fur coats into stuffed monkeys and chimps; and makes striking necklaces, at once primitive and ultra-contemporary, out of materials like cigarette butts, wire and plastic straws. Perhaps these fragments shore the artist up against her own ruin. A gift from a relative, an unwanted wedding present or a generic tourist souvenir--even the tackiest ornament once played a small symbolic function in someone's life. Upritchard re-purposes these materials to reveal their underlying purpose, to personalise and decorate our domestic spaces and to fabricate memories which can offset our knowledge of our own impending death.
Hardcover
Francis Upritchard: Human Problems
£ 40.00