Through the feedback loop of womanhood, this work reflects on feminine disquiet and investigates how self-staging and the feminine form are entangled with voyeurism and abjectification. The work exist in a space of irony, surrealism and sexuality.
My practice is concerned with the feminine experience and Kristeva’s theory of abjection, and further psychology, and has developed visual language that bridges distorted-into-motif confessions of women with the idea that the feminine body has become a palimpsest on which many of our culture’s conflicting messages about femininity are written and rewritten.
The process of felting shed animal fibres – wool fleece and dog fur – notes the abject, and is sustainability centred, embracing serendipity. In its wildish embodiment, the work posits both victimhood and the absurdness our exaggerated notions of perfection. Regardless, modern femininity requires a degree of exhibitionism, or at least willingness display oneself as decorative object; here is Dolores.
![*Dolores Ipsum*, felted wool fleece and dog fur, 227 x 114cm](https://2023.ncad.works/media/pages/graduates/ruth-o-hora/a63ca5f33d-1684763231/1-1-ruthohora-1500x-q90.jpg)
Dolores Ipsum, felted wool fleece and dog fur, 227 x 114cm
![*Dolores Ipsum*, felted wool fleece and dog fur, 227 x 114cm (detail)](https://2023.ncad.works/media/pages/graduates/ruth-o-hora/7819bcd38c-1684763231/2-2-ruthohora-1500x-q90.jpg)
Dolores Ipsum, felted wool fleece and dog fur, 227 x 114cm (detail)
![*Dolores Ipsum*, felted wool fleece and dog fur with butcher's block, 227 x 114 cm (installation view)](https://2023.ncad.works/media/pages/graduates/ruth-o-hora/763450972e-1684763231/3-3-ruthohora-1500x-q90.jpg)
Dolores Ipsum, felted wool fleece and dog fur with butcher's block, 227 x 114 cm (installation view)
![*Dolores Ipsum*, felted wool fleece and dog fur, 227 x 114cm](https://2023.ncad.works/media/pages/graduates/ruth-o-hora/7521fb3ac0-1684763231/4-4-ruthohora-1500x-q90.jpg)
Dolores Ipsum, felted wool fleece and dog fur, 227 x 114cm
Research
![Research](https://2023.ncad.works/media/pages/graduates/ruth-o-hora/bc480e43f6-1685642609/5-5-ruthohora-1024x-q80.webp)
Research
![Research](https://2023.ncad.works/media/pages/graduates/ruth-o-hora/f47379b823-1685642618/6-6-ruthohora-1024x-q80.webp)
Research
![Needle-felted motif research sample](https://2023.ncad.works/media/pages/graduates/ruth-o-hora/974eae7f86-1684763231/7-7-ruthohora-1024x-q80.webp)
Needle-felted motif research sample
![Needle-felting process](https://2023.ncad.works/media/pages/graduates/ruth-o-hora/cdfa171d9e-1684763231/8-8-ruthohora-1024x-q80.webp)
Needle-felting process