Latest Bear Survival Tactics

This is a piece I first created back in 1997 while doing an artist in residency at Worcester Centre for Craft, in Massachusetts, America. The original piece was smaller than this but along the same lines.

At the time several states were looking into allowing a limited bear cull as bear numbers had soared and they were now coming into towns. Unlike the British fox that regularly raids bins, grizzly bears are large predators that will attack people so these incursions into towns was causing much alarm. At the same time other states were hoping to re-introduce the grizzly from country they had formerly inhabited. Much debate was held about this whole subject on the radio and I came upon the idea of bear camouflage to escape the hunters in a bid to survive!

It seemed fitting to have teddy bears , named after former president Teddy Roosevelt, he gave rise to their name after an unsuccessful day the hunting party brought a small bear cub to the camp for the president to shoot. He refused because the animal did not have a chance to defend itself.

Amongst the 13 teddy bears is one blue bear. Elliot was the original bears name, made by Steiff, and auctioned at Christies in 1993 for £49,500. Its the year I started self employed, my parents gave me a newspaper cutting of it as it made the headlines. I think I may have been working on Bo Bear bears at the time. It stuck in my memory so I chose to include it in the piece. Each reproduction of this piece while uniquely made has had 1 blue bear tucked away at the back.

Its been years since I made anything like this, maybe a decade even. The bear is now my more realistic style but the overall idea is the same. Modelled while at Potfest in Penrith 2010, over the duration of the weekend. After a couple of weeks to dry it was fired to 1150 and then finished in acrylics. Available by commission.

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