Joey the Bat

Wandering through the Etsy alchemy pages a few weeks ago, I stumbled upon a request for Joey the bat. A gentleman by the name of Chris Daly has a plush bat named Joey. He tells of his adventures and travels with Joey and has taken thousands of pictures of the little grey bat. Two of Chris's current projects are a Joey the Bat childrens adventure book and a collection of Joey inspired artwork to hang in a gallery in New York. Why does this matter, you ask? Well, I put in a bid and was accepted to make a piece of artwork for the gallery! (whick is rather awesome, I might add).

The medium of choice for this endevour was watch parts. I gave the choice of painting, plush, or watch sculpture, and watch sculpture was Chris's choice. I thought I'd share my little version of Joey!

Here's some of my watch bits and the work in progress.

Yes, it is very labor intensive putting these sculptures together. I started by digging through my thousands of watch pieces to find inspiration and pieces that I thought would work. The wings had to be light so I used the coiled springs (I uncoiled them and cut them smaller). Gears and cogs make up the detail pieces.

Here's my son helping me pic out pieces. Such a good helper!

The body of my bat is a watch body (with the face and top gears removed). His face is a watch face, cut and folded on itself to form a slight cone. Gears and cogs for eyes and tiny gears around the body completes it!

All I have left to do is mount it in a shadow box and send it off!! I'm excited to hear what Chris says!!