Starcross History Society: Kattanga

Sunday, 15 April 2018

Kattanga

Work is progressing on the horse for this year's Teignmouth Recycled Art in the Landscape but more black plastic is needed.
The method to fuse the plastic together seems to have worked because the pictured head has lasted a few weeks:
Take a glue gun to put the bits in place. Use a soldering iron to melt the plastic components where they touch, and fuse together. It's a very stinky process - the fumes smell toxic. The sculpture must be sturdy enough to last outside on Teignmouth seafront for the summer.

Kattanga is his name... d'you like that? His eye is a British Telecom phone base, and his nose is a piece of a car (which was found in Church Road, Cofton) and the rest of his head is coathangers. This is the start; just one side of his head. More coathangers and plastic bits will make Kattanga's head sturdy - or maybe leave him as he is and do another one for TRAIL?

Kattanga's head

His base will be a metal frame. His ~~mane~~ main component will be black plastic coathangers. Their curved shapes are very graceful. The children from Starcross Primary School will plait his ~~main~~ mane and tail from casette and video tape. When all this junk is together, Kattanga promises to be a beautiful addition to this year's Teignmouth sculpture trail.

So we please need:

BLACK PLASTIC - nothing that can normally be recycled, but garden tools, buckets, wheelbarrows and ~~manely~~ mainly BLACK PLASTIC COATHANGERS.

VIDEO AND CASSETTE TAPES. I'll take them to pieces to use the tape to plait the ~~main~~ mane and tail.

I've contacted the world-acclaimed Newton Abbot artist Heather Jansch, who agreed straightaway to advise. That's so wonderful - take a look at her gentle horses on her website. She makes them out of driftwood, and then casts them in bronze. Look at the expressions and the movement she achieves!