ART / Modern Icons: Tim Head's Christmas tree for the Tate

IN 1989 I was invited by the Tate to decorate their Christmas tree as a temporary work of art. I created an artificial forest around the real tree, made from images cut from the polystyrene used for fast food containers. On top is a magpie, which is in fact stuffed. Magpies have always been given some magical significance - there is a magpie on the roof of the stable in the Piero Nativity at the National Gallery. I took the Christmas tree cut-out from the 'pine fresh' symbol used on packaging for household cleaning liquid. It looks at the boundary between the actual and the artificial. Synthetic products mimic natural forms. Things that we take as being quite natural really come from artificial sources. The pine fragrance is produced in a factory, which, ironically, is in the middle of the countryside. Apart from that its 'natural freshness' has never been near a pine forest.

Works by Tim Head are at the Whitechapel Gallery until 28 Feb and at the Frith St Gallery from 15 Jan

(Photograph omitted)