Monster Chetwynd announced for Mount Stuart 2023 summer commission. A major new commission for summer 2023, opening on 10th June 2023, the commission will tackle urgent global issues through a celebratory approach.
Monster Chetwynd is known for her exuberant and fun performative pieces, featuring handmade costumes, props and sets. Chetwynd creates joyful costumes and mise-en-scène which often cross the boundaries onto gallery walls with costume elements becoming overlays on facsimiles of art historical works. By inviting her to come into the neo-gothic fantasy of Mount Stuart house, the commission will embrace a playful aesthetic which also provokes serious consideration of the ongoing climate emergency.
For this project, supported by The National Lottery through Creative Scotland, Chetwynd will focus on moths: a species she continues to champion and highlight in her work as well as being one which is redolent with art historical allegory and, more anxiously, curatorial concerns. Inherent to Chetwynd’s practice is an aesthetic of recycling materials and for her work, at Mount Stuart, she proposes to re-purpose an existing work, Folding House (2011) into a Moth Hub. For this project, the transformation into Moth Hub will involve engraving the ‘house’ structure with entomological illustrations of moth species found on Bute. Subsequently, the Moth Hub will be used as a centre for research into moths building on Mount Stuart’s ongoing relationship with volunteers at Bute Museum & Natural History Society, who use the grounds for regular moth counts, contributing information to the National Moth Recording Scheme. It will also be used as a learning hub for schools and young people in summer 2023.
Inside the house, meanwhile, a selection of Chetwynd’s sculptural panels featuring larger-than-life papier mache moths will be displayed in conversation with the Mount Stuart collection of Italian masterpieces and historic portraits.
Mount Stuart is an extraordinary Neo-Gothic mansion on the Island of Bute, sitting between Glasgow, Argyll and Ayrshire on the Firth of Clyde.
Creative Scotland is delighted to be supporting this remarkable new work by the artist Monster Chetwynd. By inviting us to reimagine our relationship with the natural world this ambitious commission not only highlights the urgent need to address the climate crisis but encourages us to do this through creative thinking, and collective actions.
Amanda Catto, Head of Visual Arts, at Creative Scotland,
Mount Stuart partners with Art Fund and Monster Chetwyn on The Wild Escape
Chetwynd also plans to extend her project throughout the island by creating a parade and performance with fantastically attired performer-guides and local primary school children all of whom will appear as fluttering moths emblematic of actual moth movement patterns and migrations. This project with the school children is part of The Wild Escape, a major, UK wide, participatory project from Art Fund supported by a major National Lottery Project Grant from Arts Council England.
Led by national art charity Art Fund and with support from Arts Council England, hundreds of museums, galleries and historic houses are coming together for the largest ever collaboration between UK museums. Taking place from January to July 2023, The Wild Escape invites children to find a favourite animal in their local museum and create an artwork imagining its journey to a natural habitat. The pictures and stories children create will be brought together in a collective work of art that imagines a better future for the wildlife on our doorstep, launched online and in museums on Earth Day 2023.
The Wild Escape is an opportunity to join the urgent conversation about climate crisis and biodiversity loss and look for nature positive solutions, in partnership with leading environmental charities the RSPB and WWF and cultural organisations National Trust and English Heritage. The Wild Escape is inspired by Wild Isles, a landmark BBC series exploring the flora and fauna of the UK.
I’m thrilled that Mount Stuart is joining hundreds of organisations from the Outer Hebrides to Folkestone to connect thousands of children with the natural world through the UK’s truly great museums. Thanks to the invaluable support of Arts Council England, the Wild Escape will empower families and children across the UK to visit and discover our wonderful museums, whilst taking positive action to picture a better future for our wildlife
Jenny Waldman, Director, Art Fund,
Mount Stuart, Isle of Bute PA20 9LR mountstuart.com
About the artist
Monster Chetwynd is known for her exuberant and fun performance pieces, featuring handmade costumes, props and sets. In 2012 she was short-listed for the Turner Prize. Since then key exhibitions have included: The Idol, Soft Play Centre, Abbey Sport Centre, London, England (2015); Winter Commission, Tate Britain, London, England (2018); NOW, Scottish National Gallery of Modern Art | National Galleries of Scotland, Edinburgh, Scotland (2018), Monster Rebellion, Villa Arson, Nice, France (2019); Bat Opera Hong Kong, Massimo De Carlo, Hong Kong, China (2021); Monster Loves Bats, Konsthall C, Stockholm, Sweden (2021); The Life of Saint Bede, Glass Exchange, National Glass Centre, Durham Cathedral, Durham, England (2022); Art in a Day 2022, Copenhagen, Denmark (2022).
