I’ve wanted to do the Octomom since she first appeared in the news. The timing didn’t work out for me last time as I was traveling. I figured she would continue to stay in the news so I started collecting arms and legs from a local surplus store. I noticed that the arms and legs had been sitting in the store for months without being touched. Coincidentally when I started collecting them, another guy was also buying them up. I had to compete against the creepy guy who was apparently planning on putting these infant simulators back together and sell them online for $900 each…without the electronic parts. Yeah, good luck with that! He also said the dolls are anatomically correct. I called him creepy for that reason. It took me a few trips to the store but I ended up getting 342 legs and 184 arms. Check out the video here.
I liked the idea of painting a rosy background with white picket fence as this story was heartwarming at first. 
Then cover up the picket fence entirely with arms and legs. The music also changes to intensify the drama of raising 14 kids on welfare. 
I painted about 1/3 of them black and a few pink ones. I saved the rest of the painting until they were mounted. The painting part really sucked. The black required quite a few coats and painting hundreds of arms and legs became tedious. I couldn’t do it all in one sitting and had to keeping coming back to finish. Thank god I’m not afraid of dolls, whew!
There were moments when I was mounting a leg and the foot would wiggle, and I just wanted to tickle it. 
It was cute and creepy at the same time. Check out the final photo here.
hahaha
this is kinda creepy… but in a good-ish way.
great job.
You are creative. You never cease to amaze me. Loved this piece.
This was fun! Didnt realized it was that creepy though. It seems that many have fear of dolls. ha!
The best part is seeing you in your studio. Seeing all your original art in the background from previous projects was very cool. Thanks for sharing.
[...] It’s been awhile since I’ve been on Phil Hanson’s site and he’s added a Twitter feed (yawn) and a blog. Actually two blogs. Both have content that really enhances my appreciation of his work. For instance, last April, he deconstructed how he created a Lance Armstrong piece out of toy bicycle tire tracks through poster paint. The ’second’ personal blog called Art Happenings which seems to track his newest theme of art. The one that jumps out is called ‘octomom’, a collage of doll arms and legs to represent the woman who gave birth to octuplets recently. See the piece here and read the blog here. [...]