The first body of work in the Pigeon Hole space is now installed. The work is titled ' Pigeon – Naughty or Nice'. There are two separate windows divided by the doorway which provides interesting spaces to work in,so for the current work, I have decided to use each window to explore positive and negative aspects of the pigeon.
Window One (Nice) shows the use of pigeons in WW2, focusing on one heroic pigeon called Commando who received a medal for his efforts. He completed several important missions and provided invaluable information about the enemy. I find the whole process of awarding Commando a medal intriguing. The reward and recognition system of human achievement opened upto a pigeon who has no awareness of this at all. I've created a mocked up environment for him with WW2 planes and a podium for Commando to stand upon made of old tins.
The other window (Naughty) is about the pigeon as pest. A box of Happy Family Playing cards, based on World cities provides a random look into the worldwide issue of pigeons as pests. A card is selected and whatever city is on the card, provides a starting point for information about pigeons pest problems in that city. Rio de Janeiro is the first city and research has uncovered pigeons leaving their mess on local churches A prison in the city has inmates training pigeons to bring in drugs and mobile phones. Next stop – Madrid.
