Fun, but not all fun, inside bottles : The Tribune India

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Fun, but not all fun, inside bottles

The titles of Steve Moseley adeptly crafted miniature figures in Patience or Whimsey Bottles are satirical and witty but not spiteful

Fun, but not all fun, inside bottles

Clockwise from top: All works are by Steve Moseley and dated between 2007 and 2014. Details from “New Testament Book Signing”



B. N. Goswamy

“I find inspiration from current events and try to expose and exploit any hypocrisy. I like dealing with subjects that make people feel uncomfortable, showing what they might be thinking, but may be hesitant to admit to others or themselves.”

— Steve Moseley

Till a few weeks ago, I did not know anything about Steve Moseley: had in fact not even heard his name. But then I came upon a short article on him in a magazine someone most kindly sent me, and found both him and his work fascinating. Steve Moseley is a self-taught artist who makes, with marked skill and sharp wit, whimsical miniature figures out of wood and clay and somehow places them inside large, 1.75-litre glass bottles — mostly Knob Creek bottles of bourbon from Kentucky — reminding one of the old craft of encasing miniature ships in bottles. Those ships in bottles, however, were a form of maritime art, and it was sailors, who used to make these in their free time. Steve Moseley is not a sailor and he does not belong to old times: he is, in fact, by training a chemist, who got a degree in chemistry at a university and worked for years as a medical technician before falling prey to a rare auto-immune disease which forced him to stay at home. But he found a vocation when a friend, aware of his creative talent, suggested to him to start building what are often referred to as ‘Patience Bottles’, sometimes also called ‘Whimsey Bottles’. It requires a great deal of skill, and even more patience, because the figures are on a miniature scale and assembling these inside bottles is not an easy task. But Steve took to the art/craft like a duck to water and has been building and selling these whimseys for close to 10 years now. Today, he is a celebrity among makers of ‘bottled art’.

In and through his art, Steve likes to provoke and comment, and that is what makes his work so engaging. While ‘ships inside bottles’, even large sailing ships modelled upon famous ships of the past, elicit admiration for the skill that must have been required to assemble them, piece by tiny piece, inside a glass bottle, in their essence, these remain decorative works of craftsmanship. Steve’s work often bites and the message — there is a message almost always — goes home. Consider, for instance, a work of his in which he shows a crucifixion scene with Jesus on the cross, and a woman kneeling before it. A common enough theme, one would say, except that Jesus here is black, an ‘African American’ as someone might describe it in today’s terms. The question that Steve is asking, without being disrespectful, is: “Would White Christians believe in a Black Saviour?” The answer is still in the air, somewhere.

As themes, politics and sex and social mores attract Steve, but he does not shy away from bringing in religious figures to make his point. There is this technically very accomplished work of his, titled: New Testament Book Signing, all inside a bottle of course. At the extreme left is a table behind which the Saviour, halo duly hovering above his head, sits with pen in hand, and a placard placed nearby displays a sign reads: “Jesus Christ signs the New Testament: Sequel to the Old Testament. Based on a True Story”. Facing the table, and waiting for their copies to be signed by the Lord himself, stands a group of people — serious readers, casual visitors, tourists, and children, all included — forming a somewhat undisciplined line. A lady stands looking at an I-pad; another is taking a ‘selfie’ with her phone-camera; yet another, tired of waiting, is reading from a book while standing; the children show no interest in the proceedings, apparently because they have simply come, having been coaxed by a parent. It is not religion here that Steve is mocking at but the commercial world, this whole business of book-signing at launches with the prices slightly lowered for the occasion.

There are very carefully chosen titles — for the most part satirical and witty, but not spiteful — that Steve Moseley gives to his works, and these are often carved crudely on the bottle stoppers themselves. Two red devils, horns and tails showing, stand surrounded with or holding odd objects inside a bottle, and the title? “On the 8th day”. The clear implication is that after the seven days in which God created the world or rested were over, it was Satan who assumed charge. A tall, balding man, wearing women’s underwear — a closet cross-dresser — stands looking at himself in a mirror and the reflection he sees is that of a pretty woman in similar undress. The title? ‘Victor’s Secret and his Delusion’, the sly reference being to latent desires and to ‘Victoria’s Secret’, the famous lingerie line.

This is the world Steve Moseley brings into being inside his bottles: whimsical and sharp but always arresting. If one wonders why he does not carve figures on a larger scale — and keeps them outside, not in bottles — the answer one might hear would be simple, I think. For one, when you see an art work inside a bottle, curiosity would never leave you — “how must this have been done?” “what could have been the technique?” — ; and, two, when the object/s are so small, you are bound to look from close and therefore pay more attention, discover, even savour. It would be right, on both counts.

Addendum:

Incidentally, there is a Ships-in-Bottles Association of America, one of many throughout the world, all sharing “the common goal of promoting the traditional nautical art of building ships in bottles”. It meets every year.

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