Un messaggio nella bottiglia (A Message in a Bottle)

BY CECILIA BERTONI
2015

A friend of mine, a sound artist, asked me to make him a personalised cushion.
He gave me an old t-shirt as a starting point. On the sleeve of the t-shirt there was a darned patch where a dog had bitten through.
I decided to use only the sleeve and to make the cushion just out of elements that I associate with the person. I thought auditory and olfactory features were as important as visual and tactile. And so was born a portrait of the person.

Un messaggio nella bottiglia

DIMENSIONS OF THE CUSHION: with border 52.7 x 54 cm
DIMENSIONS OF THE BOX: 50 x 52 x 15.5 cm
TOTAL WEIGHT: 14kg

CUSHION MATERIALS:  
Touch: cotton t-shirt sleeve in khaki colour, black and red velvet, stainless steel fabric, black lace mesh fabric. Embroidery thread: black tencel, red cotton, gold wire. Red buttons.
Sound: pendant from a Masai necklace, coloured steel bells. Inside, a miniature bottle of vodka containing shards of glass.
Smell: The cushion is stuffed with cypress wood shavings and grains of myrrh incense.
Mementos/memorabilia: snake skin, two handwritten letters, red feathers.

BOX MATERIALS:
Touch and sound: cypress wood planks. The interior is smooth and the outside is rough. The interior is lined in red velvet attached to the box with red and black embroidery.
Mementos/memorabilia: antique metal clasp on the lid.

The box was made by Cipriano Menchini.