Kate H. loves reading, gymnastics, amusement parks, and deadly stuff. She wanted to do a project on deadly things, like reptiles (but not turtles). She decided to do her project on snakes.

At first, she wanted to work with live snakes, but there were rules about that and it wasn’t going to work. She decided to make sculptures of snakes because she also liked art. She didn’t know much about how to make sculptures so she tried different materials from plaster of Paris, air drying clay, oven-baked clay, a deer skull, and sticks, leftover electrical wiring, pennies, washer and netting taken from grocery foods.

Some of the snake she made from her favorite books such as Kaa from the Jungle Book, The Incredibly Deadly Viper from a Series of Unfortunate Events, and Shel Silverstein’s snake in Snake Problem. She also made some from real life including a Coral Snake, an Emerald Boa, and a Copperhead snake. Some of the snakes she made were based in cultural symbology, such as the caduceus symbol for medicine that recognizes the healing qualities of venom, the Day of the Dead skull from Mexico that represents a transition from life and death, and the Chinese Zodiac symbol for the year of the snake.

Kate raffled several of the snakes at our Imagination Celebration, raising $200 to donate to the reptile division of the Pittsburgh Zoo to help support the work they do with snakes that are endangered. Click HERE to see images of the incredible work she accomplished.