Shabby Chic Doll

Medium: Dressed porcelain doll with soft body, Cotton Fabric, Polyester Stuffing, Chalk, Pastel.

Shabby Chic Doll features a medium sized hacked doll wearing a light red flowery silk print dress with a cream lace collar. The dress is extremely fragile and has decayed into a shredded and torn state. Under the dress is an ivory-coloured petticoat with lace trim and two under slips. The hat matches the dress and has a dark pink velvet rosette. The feet and hands are porcelain including the shoes and socks which are painted. The body and head are made from fabric and stuffed.

In this ‘hacked doll’ artwork the original ‘pretty’ head of the doll has been replaced with an oversized, bald, uncanny head. Her expression is one of smug contentment which belies her ugliness. This artwork is one of a collection of hacked dolls with replaced heads begun in 2023.

The work plays with ideas of the uncanniness of the ‘doll’ – its features are changed to be unlike the usual rigid mask-like prettiness of ordinary manufactured dolls, so that it appears to be less ‘human’ but more ‘alive’.

The oversized head is inspired by comic Victorian British cartoon caricatures published in magazines and popular card games such as ‘Happy Families’.

The doll can be posed sitting down.