Photo via Flickr user Jonty Wareing/Facebook user Stacey Mammy Milner.
Damien Hirst had “Mother and Child Divided.” Tracey Emin made a quilt with the names of people she’d slept with. Marina Abramović got an audience to attack her with a razor blade and wield a loaded gun, because art.For 32-year-old Mitchell McLanaghan, the medium is not severed animal carcass suspended in formaldehyde or a canvass of dead flies, but the wax wrapper of every British child's favourite snacking cheese: Babybel.According to the Newcastle Chronicle, the Toon-based artist uses the discarded red wax casing to create sculptures of figures from television shows and films. McLanaghan, who was diagnosed with autism as a child, has moulded everything from Lord of the Rings characters to Wallace and Gromit.
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Talking to the Chronicle, McLanaghan’s sister Margaret explained: “Mitchell has autism and he’s on a very high spectrum…But when you see what he can do, it really blows you away.”She continued: “All of us are always buying Babybel so we can give Mitchell the wax. It’s always in our shopping carts. But he needs a lot more.”Photos of McLanaghan’s work are exhibited on his Facebook page, Mitchells Marvellous Models, and have garnered nationwide support. With over a thousand members on his group and 20 years experience, McLanaghan has received donations of Babybel wax from all over the globe—including from the Babybel company themselves.The Turner Prize is just a matter of time.