A British artist with autism has sculpted a microscopic rendering of the Three Kings inside the eye of a needle, to celebrate hope, light, and love this holiday season.
Willard Wigan MBE, an artist from the West Midlands in England, struggled through school but never knew he had autism until he was diagnosed at the age of 50. As a child, he turned his frustration with the school system and his fascination for patterns in nature into a passion for art; as an adult, he’s a world-renowned microscopic sculpture artist who inspires millions with his meticulous handiwork.
His latest sculpture, “The Three Little Kings,” took Mr. Wigan four and a half weeks to complete, working up to 16 hours a day. The kings and their camels are sculpted from micro fragments of nylon, the star is made from micro fragments of glitter, and the crowns are rendered in 24-carat gold. Mr. Wigan used one of his own eyelashes as a paintbrush.
“I believe in God,” Mr. Wigan told The Epoch Times. “It’s about God’s blessing. It’s about hope. It’s about light. It’s about love. So I thought, ‘I’m going to do a little tribute.’ That’s why I wanted to put it in that needle, just to explain the whole birth of Christ and then the journey to seeing Christ.
“Doing this work, it’s quite painstaking because there’s no pleasure in doing it. There’s only pleasure when you finish it and the pleasure when other people see it. ... it has a dynamic effect on people because they can’t believe that they’re so small.”
Once the Three Kings’ camels were carved, Mr. Wigan secured them to the needle by placing microscopic pieces of magnet beneath their feet before painting over them, the paint acting as an adhesive. He paints all sculptures with one of his own eyelashes glued to the end of an acupuncture needle.
“Sometimes you get tired, you can feel yourself falling asleep,” Mr. Wigan said. “One time I fell asleep with my eyes pressed against the microscope. ... The crowns on their head were the hardest.”
Mr. Wigan’s tools are uniquely custom-made. He used a Dremel tool with a fine diamond disc to polish the drill bits of his pearl drill, procured from the local jewelry supply store, into microscopic blades. He then sharpened and flattened an acupuncture needle before bending it into a “claw” to hold the nylon while he works. He sculpts between each breath.
“You have to slow your breathing down,” he said. “You have to work between the center point of the heartbeat ... it’s like trying to put a pin in a bubble without bursting the bubble.”
While Mr. Wigan’s work elicits powerful responses from the public—he was even invited to meet the Queen of England at Buckingham Palace after sculpting the royal crown—the artist is reluctant to feel satisfied with his sculptures, reasoning, “I’m improving all the time, but I’m always telling myself I can only get better.”
One life lesson that Mr. Wigan has internalized since establishing his career as an artist is that he wouldn’t be who he is today without his autism, and he wants others to feel equally empowered.
His message to anyone with a learning difference is to take inspiration from his achievements and know that they have it in them to do the same. To parents, he advises, “If you have kids with autism, encourage them because once you tell somebody that they’re good at what they do, it inspires them.”
