{"id":2946,"date":"2019-11-01T08:00:55","date_gmt":"2019-11-01T12:00:55","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/news.colgate.edu\/magazine\/?p=2946"},"modified":"2019-10-29T09:23:52","modified_gmt":"2019-10-29T13:23:52","slug":"hat-tricks","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/news.colgate.edu\/magazine\/2019\/11\/01\/hat-tricks\/","title":{"rendered":"Hat Tricks"},"content":{"rendered":"\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">Armed with clay, aluminum foil, and faux hair, Brenda Killackey-Jones \u201996 went in for the kill.&nbsp;<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">Her prey was already dead.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">The Hatbox Ghost, a popular figure in Disneyland and Disney World\u2019s famed Haunted Mansion ride, served as inspiration for one of Killackey-Jones\u2019 latest sculptures. She recreated the spirit into a hanging piece, which she entered in Disney\u2019s D23 Expo Design Challenge. Deemed frightening enough to be a finalist, her version of the ghoul was displayed at the fan convention in August.&nbsp;<\/p>\n\n\n\n<div class=\"gb_sidebar\"><ul class=\"wp-block-list\"><li>Killackey-Jones has visited the Haunted Mansion in Disneyland and Disney World nearly 40 times combined.<\/li><li>Major: <a href=\"https:\/\/www.colgate.edu\/academics\/departments-programs\/department-art-and-art-history\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noreferrer noopener\" aria-label=\"Art and art history (opens in a new tab)\">Art and art history<\/a><\/li><li>Day jobs: Art teacher and fitness instructor<\/li><\/ul><\/div>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">\u201c[The Hatbox Ghost] is a funky character \u2014 it\u2019s one of the ones that everybody talks about,\u201d she says.&nbsp;<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">A sculptor for the past five years, Killackey-Jones hones her craft preparing what she calls \u201cmythological taxidermy\u201d to sell at Renaissance festivals and Comic Cons. Ranging from emerald dragon heads to yeti busts, the pieces hang on walls for easy display. She came up with the moniker because she uses traditional taxidermy foam to make her figures. \u201cI carved their faces, then re-sculpted it either as a dragon, a werewolf, or whatever I wanted it to be. It would end up looking like a taxidermy form,\u201d she says. \u201cIt was taxidermy, but it was mythological creatures.\u201d&nbsp;<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">Like the animatronic Hatbox Ghost in the Haunted Mansion, Killackey-Jones\u2019 sculpted version leaps out at the viewer, but key differences show her creative hand. The original figure uses lighting to trick riders, first appearing with his head on straight, then with his head removed, resting in a hat box. Because she had size limitations for D23, Killackey-Jones eliminated the hatbox, choosing instead to give the top hat more play. \u201cThere are certain attributes that make the Hatbox Ghost recognizable,\u201d she says. \u201c[I had to] take the facial features and the eyes and the skeletal hands and then make them work within the constraints of the particular frame.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">After showing her piece at D23, Killackey-Jones went back to her home in Rochester, N.Y., to prepare for her next supernatural event: Halloween.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">\u201cHalloween is our favorite season,\u201d she says. \u201cWe\u2019ve got all sorts of things that I\u2019ve made, like all of the creatures from <em>The<\/em> <em>Nightmare Before Christmas<\/em> in life size.\u201d<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Sculptor Brenda Killackey-Jones \u201996 was a finalist in Disney&#8217;s D23 Expo Design Challenge with her spooky take on one of the Haunted Mansion&#8217;s most famous ghouls.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1222,"featured_media":2947,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_jetpack_newsletter_access":"","_jetpack_dont_email_post_to_subs":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_tier_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paywalled_content":false,"_jetpack_hide_featured_image":false,"_jetpack_featured_image_duplicate_dismissed":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[9],"tags":[37,489],"coauthors":[168],"class_list":["post-2946","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-endeavor","tag-art","tag-sculpture"],"jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"jetpack_shortlink":"https:\/\/wp.me\/palXSH-Lw","amp_enabled":true,"jetpack_featured_media_url":"https:\/\/news.colgate.edu\/magazine\/wp-content\/uploads\/sites\/6\/2019\/10\/hatbox.jpg","_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/news.colgate.edu\/magazine\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2946","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/news.colgate.edu\/magazine\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/news.colgate.edu\/magazine\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/news.colgate.edu\/magazine\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1222"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/news.colgate.edu\/magazine\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=2946"}],"version-history":[{"count":7,"href":"https:\/\/news.colgate.edu\/magazine\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2946\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":3030,"href":"https:\/\/news.colgate.edu\/magazine\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2946\/revisions\/3030"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/news.colgate.edu\/magazine\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/2947"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/news.colgate.edu\/magazine\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=2946"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/news.colgate.edu\/magazine\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=2946"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/news.colgate.edu\/magazine\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=2946"},{"taxonomy":"author","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/news.colgate.edu\/magazine\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/coauthors?post=2946"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}