I’ll never forget the childhood joy of having Spiderman sit on my lap, yes MY LAP. I was used to sitting on other peoples laps; mum’s, nana’s, pop’s, Santa’s, so to have a real life superhero agree to sit on my lap was truly a magical moment. Everyone loves a superhero. They make the impossible possible. Able to leap tall buildings in a single bound, move faster than a speeding bullet, become invisible and see in the dark. To put this into perspective I was only eight at the time and Spiderman was actually my sister Sally dressed up, but the magic was still there and to top it off I got a photograph to permanently capture one of the greatest moments of my life.
From a young age Sally was not only keen on dressing up but also fashioning costumes from whatever she could lay her hands on around our house. With only two years between us, Sally and I regularly inhabited fictional worlds together – the Land of the Giants, A-team, Star Wars, Monkey magic, posh tea parties – all of which required the appropriate costume, of course. Who would have thought that a beater or a whisk could be a sword, that a tea-towel could be a bandana, dress, wound dressing, nurse’s smock or a whip? ‘Make believe’ is the imaginative and creative domain of the child and we embraced our creativity. The X-Box generation are really missing out on something here. They inhabit foreign soil and alien planets on a television screen, we recreated it like the Hollywood studios did with the moon landing.
Costume designing is not only the profession of the child though; Sally still relishes any opportunity to build a creation for herself or someone else to wear. Ingenious examples of costume design and production abound in our ‘noughties’ society. One trip to Facebook or YouTube will provide the web surfer with an abundance of strangely clad individuals parading around without a care in the world.
Offbeat. Left of field. Quirky. Kitsch. All these terms accurately describe Sally and her creations. Not content to just put a patch on her eye, make a sword out of foil and call herself a Pirate (although she has once or twice), she dreams on a more grandiose scale, of costumes that no one expects, with surprising complexity. She has produced amazing costumes at home - a full length Lego man suit, a Vegemite jar – and more functional ones which I will now describe in more depth.
A casino night in Whistler, Canada, beckoned, and there was a need for an appropriate costume. People arrived as James Bond, Playboy bunnies, mobsters and then there was Sally, dressed as a croupier (nothing strange there) with a poker table around her waist. People could play a round, rest their drink, socialise and win chips all at Sally’s mobile poker table. Service with a smile, except the smiles soon disappeared when human poker table needed a toilet break or to rest her weary legs.
The pièce de résistance, the epitome, the crème de la crème was the men’s urinal. You may now have a puzzled expression, squinted eyes, wondering “what is Ben talking about now?”, but fear not. A party invitation arrived once with the instructions to arrive as something beginning with a ‘P’. On the night of the party a collection of pirates, pandas, policemen and princes arrived, along with Sally, who fronted as a piss-trough (PT), a men’s urinal. Before you cringe in horror or judge, hear me out. This was a stunning creation, the detail impeccable. It was worn around the waist, straps on each side over the shoulders. It was clad in foil to resemble stainless steel and had two trough cakes (used to scent the urinal) as the final touch. Partygoers were stunned, frightened, appalled and intrigued. Laughter ensued once it was explained. Unfortunately some of the world’s finest creations have been subjected to vandalism and Sally’s crowning glory was no different. Whilst resting outside, PT positioned on the ground beside her, a couple of inebriated partygoers mistook this work of art as a merely functional receptacle. Their business done, they stumbled on, oblivious to the damage they had inflicted. The PT was no more, the dream had died. Another testament to modern society had been defiled and left to ruin.
It seems that even the greatest minds are subject to ridicule, embarrassment and abuse. Sally’s resolve was tested but not broken. Just next week she is planning a comeback, and I am waiting for my Budgerigar suit to arrive in the mail, so I can attend the trivia night at my local pub as the mascot, and proudly show that my sister’s creative spirit is still strong. I just hope nobody arrives on the night dressed as a cat!
No comments:
Post a Comment