I'll be out in a minute

May 15, 2015 9:04 PM

This past year, artist Lucy Gafford developed an intriguing new medium. It's well suited to evocative sketches of simple subjects -- a portrait of Mom, a still life of avocados, a cat, a feeding pig. Please enjoy her hashtag exhibition, #ShowerHairMasterpiece.
posted by Countess Elena (11 comments total)

Ha!
posted by cortex at 9:40 PM on May 15, 2015

The paneling of my shower is plastic, but it's faux-marble or something, and somehow there's a mosquito-trapped-in-amber sort of thing going on on the back wall. I like incorporating it into my own showerhair masterpieces.
posted by Corinth at 10:33 PM on May 15, 2015

I would totally do this all the time, but I already have a lot of important daydreaming to do when I'm in the shower.
posted by rifflesby at 10:47 PM on May 15, 2015 [1 favorite]

These are all pretty cool, but for some reason the one of the pig eating a hair lunch gives me a slight gaggy feeling. I do not understand why this is.
posted by GrumpyDan at 11:59 PM on May 15, 2015

I prefer to explore in three dimensions by making sculptures out of whatever I find clogging the drainpipe.
posted by not_on_display at 12:00 AM on May 16, 2015

That's a hairless cat, isn't it?
posted by StickyCarpet at 2:18 AM on May 16, 2015

She is obviously working with very limited materials. I could do a half-scale Guernica fom my morning shower drain collection of post-partum hair loss.
posted by romakimmy at 2:36 AM on May 16, 2015 [4 favorites]

Gross. Doesn't anyone else just bin the hair that comes out during a shower?

My flatmates just let theirs go down the drain. It clogs. I'm left to pull out their hair. Yes I'm bitter!
posted by Braeburn at 2:49 AM on May 16, 2015

Wow. It took me disturbingly long to figure this out.

Well played, Countess, well played indeed.
posted by Samizdata at 7:08 AM on May 16, 2015

Oooh! Oooh! I can do this! Quick, how do you do that "twitter" thing? I've got pictures and pictures of sculptures I made by arranging banana peels in my freezer.
posted by Rich Smorgasbord at 1:12 PM on May 16, 2015

Man... when I quit my job in 2012 to take my design and animation studio full-time, I too invented this medium, and thought about selling prints. I thought it could become a craze where people felt these images belonged on their bathroom walls. I created 7-8 pieces, but they were pretty terrible. I have much shorter hair, so the line control is lacking. Also, the way I conceived of the art form back then, it requires that the drawing is made with my toes, after they grab the hair out of the drain. I got pretty good with my toes, but the craftsmanship of it is not always easy to appreciate for the casual viewer. Or for anyone, really.

Seeing Gafford's work makes me content that I probably made the right choice in not pursuing the idea further. Her hair is considerably more expressive. Nevertheless, hopefully this post ensures me a mention in art history books.
posted by edlundart at 12:48 PM on May 18, 2015