Rubbish is pretty much a stable part of Danielle Lowys life, she sorts out other peoples rubbish and revamps it with extra character.
Resident Quda journalist Shauna Askew popped along to find out all about Danielles practices and how she goes about creating her art.
How long have you been revamping rubbish, what initially inspired you to start?
I’ve been running Rubbish Revamped for about 2 and a half years, I got quite into making things out of rubbish, I found it quite a challenge and quite fun. I was doing some craft sessions with friends and then thought well I could try and do this as job, and it’s been really successful. As well as doing the workshops for people I do quite a lot for organisations around Manchester, community centre groups, family fun days etc.
How easy is it to set up an arts business?
I know for some people they are very good at their arts and the business side can be a bit more difficult, but I do quite enjoy all of that and it was familiar to me. In a way the art side was new to me, because I just liked doing bits and bobs, crafting myself. I really can’t comment, I think it can depend on what people are doing as well can’t it.
What is the most versatile ‘rubbish’ that you use in your art?
For me it’s socks, you can do so much with them, it’s like a piece of material. I do sock monkeys, sock monsters, sock bunnies and Mousevaarks! Another material that I use quite a lot is buttons, and I run a number of workshops using them; button bracelets, little button hearts, decorating a bag, brooches. People get quite excited about buttons!
Do you need a lot of equipment to get creative with ‘rubbish?
No not at all. And something that I’m always really happy to be able to tell people, is that the material and the tools are things that people have around the house anyway, so anybody who comes to my workshops can do exactly what they’ve done at the workshop at home without a big investment. I think that that’s really important.
Are there any places you like to scavenge for unusual ‘junk’ to reuse in your art?
It tends to be mainly household materials, I get lots of things given to me, I try to scrounge a lot of things, I’ve been on freecycle to ask for things. It’s things like greeting cards, CD’s, buttons and socks.
What’s the strangest piece of rubbish you have used?
I don’t think I’ve used anything really strange because in a way that’s what Rubbish Revamped is about. That it’s taking all your normal rubbish, old clothes, broken jewellery, junk mail, it is all those very mundane bits and bobs and doing something a bit more fun and exciting with them.
Do you ever create large sculptures?
I’m doing a larger sculptural piece for the big art trail, the plastic flowers made from bottles are not big individually, but as a piece they will be because they’re going to hang from a tree really high up.
Do you ever create whole identities for your sock creatures, such as names and backstories?
No not really, but once I made a sock creature from my Dads sock, to look like him because he dressed in brown a lot. Last year at the Barnaby festival, Macclesfield, they had the theme of Alice in Wonderful, I had a display which was the mad hatters tea party, I had two sock monkeys made from the same socks; Tweedledee and Tweedledum and had the Mad Hatter with the big hat, and I think I had a mouse in a teapot so that was quite fun.
What advice can you give for people who want to start revamping rubbish?
Have a look at my website, I put on freebie step by step illustrated guides. Or come to a workshop and have a go. Go to a craft fair, because I’m not the only one who’s doing this. Look at what’s around you, if people want to get into revamping their rubbish, it depends what skill they have. There’s loads you can do with paper; you can do junk mail jewellery, swirly pots, weave baskets, origami. It sounds really tacky but I think there’s something for everybody!
Where can your work be found exhibited?
Well of course the Chorlton Arts festival flowers. Then, in September it’s Didsbury Arts Festival and they do something called Art over the counter, where artists display in shop keepers windows, they’ve matched me up with a charity shop and they’ve asked if I can have crafts which are made from things in the shop.
And previously I applied to use a shop space in January, I thought after Christmas it would be a really fun thing to cheer people with sock monkeys swinging in the window, it was really good fun.
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