Artist wires animal instinct
When Michelle Aplin made a goat out of chicken wire one day she had no idea it was to be the start of a booming career.
The former registered nurse now makes commissioned lifesize pieces and the handcrafted galvanised wire animals and people she creates take on a life of their own.
‘‘About one and-a-half years ago I started making a wire goat when I was out fencing,’’ she said.
Since then her skills, and sculptures, have grown. In the garden of her Waimate home a horse sculpture jumps over a horizontal pole, a wire dog urinates on a tree and a man pushes a wheelbarrow full of piglets.
Surprised by her success as she has no art training, the sculptor is now getting orders for her creations from throughout the country.
A life-size dog will take her about a week to complete wearing gloves and using pliers and snips. The smaller works are more fiddly so she can’t wear gloves which often results in stabbed fingers from pointy wire ends.
Honouring the history of the area the horse in her garden was made to commemorate the first New Zealand Grand National Steeplechase held a few paddocks away from her home, in 1875.
Stuff reported the inaugural event which was observed as a public holiday with much drinking and merriment. By the afternoon fights broke out and a spooked police horse knocked over the Wheel of Fortune and the woman running it. She was not injured.
In another part of her sculpture garden sits the original wooden Willowbridge Station
Willowbridge shelter built in 1915 – it was used until 1972. Inside Aplin has created a man sitting on the bench waiting for the train. A wind-up telephone is attached to the wall with the original instructions next to it.
In one section reality gives way to fantasy as a monkey hangs from the branch of a tree and a fairy enchants the rest of the garden.
Aplin was living in Tarras 18 months ago when she made the first goat; friends encouraged her and soon she was selling a variety of sculptures. She moved with her husband Jason to Waimate in October last year. In June, she exhibited 10 pieces at the Form Gallery in Christchurch and sold them all.
Her plan is to fill her garden with more creatures and a circus section, yet to be started.
She will open her Waimate sculpture garden to the public on November 9.