A Nervous Harbour

Shing Yin Khor keeps pushing herself and thus making amazing displays for her beastly creations. For “A Nervous Harbour“, Shing  has even more shadow boxes filled with the replica natural habitats of her ill-fated wonderous creatures.

This time around, we have the “Watery Gravebeast“! Stranger Factory gets two specimens surrounded by their natural and colorful coral, and these expression filled, tentacle wrapped gill breathers look quite comfy in their new home. Complete with a vintage taxonomy tag straight out of a 1950’s Bio class, Shing creates a perfect faux study of amazing animals.

Shing Yin Khor’s “A Nervous Harbour” opens September 6th at Stranger Factory Gallery. Shing will be present to talk about all her creations and their fun lives.

Shing Yin Khor is most definitely living up to her pseudonym “Sawdust Bear” with her show “A Nervous Harbour” at Stranger Factory this September. Straight out of zoology class, Shing has cut, constructed, and stained several shadow boxes for diorama displays containing her lovable and yet sometimes grumpy creatures and bugs.

Shing takes her post-mortem creatures back to their natural settings with her fabulous displays. You might find a “Kelpy Frilled Fattybug” nestled among its natural kelp and driftwood (above) or a snailbit in a coral study (below).

Shing also takes her work a step further down the museum path with a shadow box detailing the life cycle of the kelpy frilled fattybug. Three stages of cute and wonder, but are these polyp, ephyra, and medua stages? If you are as curious as we are on her creations, you can ask Shing herself at the opening September 6th, because she will be on hand to talk all about her delightful sculptures.

Clown Jellies have been spotted at Shing Yin Khor’s  “A Nervous Harbour” . Shing has done what many oceanographers have only attempted, she has cataloged the infamous Clown Jelly for her show at Stranger Factory.

As she explains –

“Clown Jellies are invertebrates that are only visible in the water that is between 24 to 25 meters deep, no more, no less. If seen, Clown Jellies are easily distinguished by their vibrant colour. While colour wavelengths are absorbed by water, leaving much of the ocean a dullish blue tint to the human eye, Clown Jellies will always appear brightly coloured to divers, even if that is theoretically a scientific impossibility.”

Early reports say Shing has a couple different species of Clown Jelly specimens ready for the public, but right now only one has been spotted.

Above, we have one of the infamous Helmeted Clown Jellies. To keep the species true to form, Shing has created wood boxes with articles from the sea to simulate their home environment, but she also lets them stand alone in all their glory. Now, the Helmeted Clown Jellies are easily distinguishable from similar species by the helmet-like structure atop of their heads that sort of resembles a cap worn by the famous Steve Zissou crew members. We will have to find out from Shing’s research what this added structure means to the jellies, but we do know it adds a wonderous array of colors to this wonderful creature.
You will find Shing’s Clown Jellies at “A Nervous Harbour” from September 6th – 29th, with an opening reception on Friday, September 6th from 6 – 9 PM. Shing will be present, and wishing Brad was there so she can crack new jokes.