Collections Within My Collection: Animal Artistry Customs

When you consider collections within a collection, it is highly likely that a model might fit into several different collections that are within the larger group simply labeled "Model Horse Collection."

My Animal Artistry pieces are the perfect example of that. They can be sorted into these groups:

~ Chinas

~ Circus Horses

~ RubberNedz

~ Animal Artistry

~ Europeanware

~ Scale

~ Resins

~ Models with tack

~ Customs

See what I mean? And as I was wrapping up the second of the customs posts, I realized that every single one of my Animal Artistry pieces was also a custom. Their color, tack, and plumes were all chosen either by me or, in one case, someone else. 

Misty Dawn, 2017

Around ten years ago, Donna Chaney was doing a Limited Edition Rearing Circus Horse  of 25 in bone china.

Knowing what had worked well before, Donna helped me with the color choices.  I ordered silver tack with blue plumes on a grey horse.

She told me the wait would be long, but I was fine with that. A year later, Misty Dawn arrived on my porch. I am so pleased with how it turned out.

Merriment, 2018 

In 2018 I went to a swap meet and discovered this Classic sized resin on a sales table. Painted in 2002 by Lisa Rivera, it is an older piece but still quite lovely and affordable. Home with me it came. Knowing that I would never own the piece in china, I was so excited to have the resin.

At one point after joining my collection, disaster struck this piece. It tipped over and out the open china cabinet door. Despite the carpeting on the floor, I heard it break into pieces as it tumbled onto the ground. Fortunately, a trip to Jenn Danza made this beautiful resin whole again.

Merrilee, 2015 or so

A curio scale Striking Arabian Circus Horse in resin, I asked Donna to paint it in a leopard Appaloosa with gold and red tack and plumes.

Sadly, despite Donna's excellent packing job, a plume broke off while being shipped from England. The piece was also tippy and fell over many times on the shelf. I had it repaired but when it most recently toppled and lost a leg and plume,

I gathered the pieces and put them in an envelope and let the pony rest on the shelf as it was.

Gingerbredz, 2015 

 I had always thought that Donna's RubberNedz were cute, but I am not one for My Little Ponyesque models.

(Photo from Google Images and credited to chestnutridgeblog.com.)

Until I saw a RubberNedz Circus Pony done on her Tagus mold, and accented with Swarovski crystals. Immediately I emailed Donna and asked for a RubberNedz Circus Pony.

Together we came up with a color theme using my favorite color of orange along with gold, accented with Swarovski crystals, on a bay horse.

I fell in love with him and named him Gingerbredz.

Mr. Nedz 2020

Donna was at BreyerFest in 2017 and she and I finally had a chance to chat in person. She had a gorgeous traditional sized rearing Andalusian on display that was either resin or bone china. As I shared with her my love of Gingerbredz, she mentioned that she planned to turn the piece into a RubberNedz Circus Horse.

The cost she quoted was enough that I needed to think about it before buying. And think I did. Later that summer, I wrote Donna and asked if I could purchase one. She was willing to take my order, and agreed to paint it bay with orange and gold tack to match Gingerbredz. I knew it would be a while before I got it; Donna had once written that the RubberNedz were time consuming to make, but I also knew that it would be worth the wait.

When he arrived, I was struck by how heavy he was. Much more than plastic, resin, or china! But he was stunning.

I  named him Mr. Nedz (those of you who remember the TV show, Mr. Ed, will catch the reference) and have had a lot of fun with him. 

Despite the Fabio hair, he has done well in shows. I enjoy setting up scenes with him, not just for shows but simply for fun, too. (The flamingos are a running joke between Anne Field and me; I enjoy sending her performance pics with them.)

Not only is this collection within my collection part of the customs collection, it is also all of my Animal Artistry pieces - this post actually covered two of my collections within my collection.

That ticks off the box for customs on my list of collections to cover. There are more collections to come!

Stay 'tooned!

More on Models made with Rubber

Yesterday after writing about my new Vincenzos and how their legs had bent, a reader pointed me to an  interview posted on Triple Mountain Model Horses where Nicolette, owner of Wia, wrote that the company was aware of the problem. She also stated that Wia models could begin to warp at temperatures as low as 80 degrees Fahrenheit.

We are working on solutions to reduce this as well. This is something you cannot solve to 100%, because of the material. This is something every brand has to deal with. It can be thin legs, tails, antlers, you name it. Those rubber mixtures start reacting at approx. 26C° (80 F), this can easily be reached. Even if the whole room does not feel so hot, there are always spots that can reach those temperatures. Sometimes it is enough to have a figurine sitting on an external hard drive and so on. Most other brands have solved (or tried to solve) this with thick legs. We do not want to go out of proportion. So this is a small price to pay, because everybody can fix this ‘problem’ in a minute. Just gently heat the bent part of a figurine (no matter if WIA, Papo Schleich, etc.) and the bent parts will go back to their original posture, no manipulation of the figurine necessary. Just make sure that while cooling there is no pressure on any of the heated parts. To speed up the process you can always use cold water. If the figurines are close to a heat source it is possible you have to repeat this from time to time.

Nicolette posted similar instructions on Blab. However, in responses to that, at least one person wrote that, after straightening the legs with hot/cold water, the legs began to warp again within a few months.

Donna Chaney's wonderful Rubbernedz are also made of rubber and, like the Wia horses, they bend. A well-placed rock helps keep Mr. Nedz' legs in the proper position. 

This is how he looked when he arrived from the factory. Look at how the front legs are even in this photo compared to the first one. The stand that supports his weight causes the rubber legs to bend.

I've tried a variety of other stands

including one on the belly, but even with padding, that marred the paint and left a small divot from the pressure of the body against the stand.

Gingerbredz, who is a much smaller, lighter Rubbernedz done on the Tagus mold, also has a hind leg that is bending.

My solution? I am keeping Mr. Nedz in changing positions - lying down on one side, lying down on the other, frequently changing stands while he is upright, and then repeating this cycle. Gingerbredz and the two Vincenzos will be left alone.

The Wia owner said that bending is just a part of having models made with rubber and that's proving true with the four I have in my collection. I can't speak for others, but lovely though these rubber models are (and those paint jobs are gorgeous!) I am not going to purchase any more. 

I will enjoy the rubber models already in my collection, admire others from afar, and stick with plastic and chinas. 

Circus Time: Donna's Charming RubberNedz

We are back at Donna Chaney's Animal Artistry in England for today's post as we look at Donna's charming RubberNedz pieces. Below is the first picture I ever saw of a RubberNedz. A rubber circus horse with overlong mane and tail and huge feather plumes? I was all in and wanted one for my own collection.

Photo from Google Images which credits it to chestnutridgeblog.com.

I emailed Donna and after some correspondence back and forth about colors and such, she sent me this lovely piece.

This is Gingerbredz, a RubberNedz done on Donna's Tagus mold. Oh, my goodness, I was hooked! 

I had asked for a bay color with four white socks and orange and gold trim.

The detail in the horse's paintwork is lovely. This was my first RubberNedz, but it wasn't my last.

I stopped by Donna's booth at BreyerFest in 2017 and chatted with her. She told me that she had begun making her Rearing Andalusian Stallion as RubberNedz Circus Horses and showed me the one she had brought as a sample. It was beautiful, and sure gave me something to think about.

This may be that piece she had as a sample, but I am not sure. Unfortunately, I did not take a photo of it, but I think it was white with blue like this one. (Photo retrieved from Google Images, I think. Maybe Facebook? It was in my files and I forgot to record where I got it.)

Later that summer, I wrote Donna and asked if I could purchase one. She was willing to take my order, and agreed to paint it bay with orange and gold tack to match Gingerbredz. I knew it would be a while before I got it; Donna once wrote that the RubberNedz were time consuming to make, but I also knew that it would be worth the wait.

Was he ever! He's big, beautiful, and like the Metlox drafters, very heavy.

The mane is long and very, very full. Donna added Swarovsky crystals to the bridle and harness, too.

I named him Mr. Nedz (those of you who remember the TV show, Mr. Ed, will catch the reference) and have had a lot of fun with him. (Did you know that you can stream episodes of Mr. Ed on Amazon?)

My hope is that Donna will use another of her molds for a RubberNedz circus horse. When and if she does, you can bet I will be ordering one.

Tomorrow, we will  head back to the states.

Prepare to be amazed!

Circus Girls - A Dream Come True

Circus girls! My favorite imaginative game to play as a kid. Leslie and I would pack cardboard suitcases (swiped from our dolls) and get on the circus train (the couch) and  travel to the circus's next destination. (Always the back yard.) There we would put on performances before packing up again and traveling to the next town.

Leslie and I grew out of our game, but we are both very fond of the memories. "Of course I remember Circus Girls!" Leslie responded when I asked. "Those were tremendous memories!" Yep! They sure were.The Circus Girls actually got to go to Baraboo, Wisconsin and meet some real circus horses when we were a little older. That was a treat. (Leslie and me along with our little sister, Jenny.)

Finally, after years and years of thinking about it, I circled  back to my Circus Girl roots. I did some research and asked Donna Chaney to make me a RubberNedz Circus Horse and Anne Field to make me a Circus Girl Doll. 

The end result was just as I'd hoped and imagined it to be. I never had a real horse who looked like Mr. Nedz, but I did have someone who looked like my new doll. 

You see, my elegant new doll is me, Circus Girl Lynn. And she is just as I imagined her, all those years ago.

Thanks so much, Anne, for bringing my dream to life. 

(I'll explain Flamingo Pond tomorrow.)

Big Plans

I have big plans for my new RubberNedz Andalusian Circus Horse.

First, I am trying to find a stand for him. I like this round acrylic jewelry display stand.

 And I like this rectangular acrylic jewelry stand, too.

 The original stand is sculpted to look like a tree branch

and has a notch in it where his hoof rests. It's made of a harder plastic and doesn't bend or give under the weight of the horse. Still, I have a hard time not holding my breath when I use it, and Donna did tell me that most people find something else to keep this piece upright.

But there is something else I am working on, and that is the replication in miniature of a childhood dream. My sister and I used to pretend that we were performers in a circus (bareback riders). We would spend time "performing" in the back yard, riding the circus train (i.e. the couch) to the circus's next destination, and we even had little cardboard suitcases (I think borrowed from our Barbies) that we would pack and take with us as the circus traveled. 

We also took ballet lessons - everyone KNOWS that circus riders are really ballerinas, right? At least that's what we thought. (Google Images of Wesley Dennis illustration; all other circus and pattern photos from Google Images.)

With those memories in mind, I decided to explore making a vintage circus scene from the late 1950s/early 1960s. I had the horse, but I needed either a bareback rider

 or a ringmaster (since my RubberNedz is rearing.) And I wanted it to be female

because the doll would represent me. Who better to talk to about my ideas than Anne Field of Field of Dolls Studio?

I researched a lot of old circus photos trying to find a costume that was not the glitzy and glittery Las Vegas style. 

Then I came across this photo from a vintage pattern book. That ballerina dress was just what I was looking for. It's elegant and pretty, definitely circus worthy, but not so over the top that it detracts from the real beauty in the ring - the horse.

Anne helped me decide on fabric and had some ideas for accents to the dress, and then agreed to create the doll for me. 

This is new territory for me but I am super excited.

My New RubberNedz!

Donna Chaney of Animal Artistry  has been making lovely china and resin pieces since 1983. I especially love her circus horses and have several of them:

 A small Striking Arabian Circus Horse in resin,

a Limited Edition Rearing Circus Horse in bone china,

and Tagus done as a RubberNedz Circus Horse. This was my first RubberNedz. But it wasn't my last.

I stopped by Donna's booth at BreyerFest last year and chatted with her. She told me that she had begun making her Rearing Andalusian Stallion as RubberNedz Circus Horses and showed me the one she had brought as a sample. (Sadly, I did not take a photo of it.) It was beautiful, and sure gave me something to think about.

Later that summer, I wrote Donna and asked if I could purchase one. She was willing to take my order, and agreed to paint it bay with orange and gold tack to match my other piece. I knew it would be a while before I got it; Donna once wrote that the RubberNedz were time consuming to make, but I knew it would be worth the wait.

Last month Donna wrote me and said he was nearly done and that she would be mailing him soon. A week or so later I received a tracking number and began watching its slow progress from Herefordshire, England to Indiana.

It took almost three weeks to arrive, and went from New York to Miami before coming to Indiana.

But at last that box arrived.

 And I am thrilled to have him!

Big plans are in the work for this one. More about that in a future post.

My New RubberNedz Circus Pony!

Donna Chaney has a fairly new line called RubberNedz which she has said are for the inner child in all of us as well as a way for her to relax and have fun away from the china business. (From her Facebook pages.)

Last August I emailed her and asked if she would do a circus pony for me with my favorite color, orange, for feathers. She agreed, and he arrived today - I was literally blown away at what was in the box!

 I'd only seen a couple of photos of them, so I was expecting something more along the lines of a My Little Pony when it came to realism.

What I got was a beautifully detailed piece for my circus pony collection! The headstall of the bridle even has orange crystals to simulate bridle rosettes!

Donna used her Tagus mold for this piece, and I think he looks wonderful as a circus pony. I am so, so happy with my first RubberNedz.