The idea for this diorama came from a story that my uncle Dennis used to tell me when he came to visit me in hospital.
My hospital bed was my world for one year. It was boring and drab in that bed, but I lived via my vivid imagination and the family visits, which were for an hour, twice a day. It was difficult for Mum and Dad, so other members of the extended family would take turns to visit, such as brothers, sisters and uncles and aunts. One family member that I particularly loved to see was my uncle Dennis and auntie Nora.
Not only was Uncle Dennis funny and very entertaining, he was the first person in the family to have a video recorder, so he could watch films at home that I had never heard of. Uncle Dennis was able to have this expensive piece of equipment because he had an insurance job for a London company, which, as he said, meant, “A London job with a London wage.” So I used to ask Uncle Dennis about these films he’d seen – which was always exciting, as he was a great storyteller, and he would take time to paint a picture for me with words. I would ask him, “What films have you seen lately, Uncle Dennis?” And it would start off with mainstream films like ‘Close Encounters of the Third Kind’, which was all well and good, but eventually he would start telling me about other films he had seen, such as ‘The Inseminoid’. As an 11-year-old lad with an active imagination, the title of this unknown film really captured my attention.
“What’s ‘The Inseminoid’, Uncle Dennis?” I asked.
Uncle Dennis was a great storyteller, so he laid out the story in all of its gory details, which basically came down to alien monsters getting bikini-clad women pregnant. Now, I was a young lad who was entering puberty, so this film really played on my mind.
In the intervening years I revisited the story and decided to create my tribute to Uncle Dennis and Auntie Nora, and all those who visited me in hospital. I decided to make my own Inseminoid – even though I’ve never actually seen the film.
The diorama’s in a green cabinet with a yellow pattern carved on the panel at the bottom. Inside there are two figures looking at each other.
The monster on the left, a kind of exotic, one-eyed cactus creature, is not threatening. It’s got two thick spiky branches, one like the body, with a big eye on top. The other branch sticks out stiffly, curving up. The whole thing is like an 11-year-old lad in a costume – his red calliper boots sticking out at the bottom. My Inseminoid is on the right, and represents what my illness was doing to me. The Inseminoid is literally see-through, with translucent pink skin. All the colourful things going on inside are visible. It’s got green bones, pink viruses and tiny red soldiers climbing around. The Inseminoid is grinning, showing all its teeth. It’s reaching out to the prickly cactus, touching its stiff, curving branch with a forefinger. There are pink jellyfish and green stars all around them, and the whole scene has a cheerful jagged red frame.