So Much Sculpture!!
There seems to be a burst of sculpture in Devon this season & it is so welcome. Gladly I will share some of my favourite works here but be warned, there are some big hitters.
Between The Box & Karst in Plymouth, the Exeter Phoenix & studio KIND. in Braunton, north Devon there is an array of spaces, places & styles catered for. Some of the all time greats are on show right now in Devon & its super exciting.
These first sets of work are from the Exeter Phoenix. In the galleries are works that are part of the exhibition Patternicity & in the small window box space is a sculptural work by Donna Mitchell from an on going series called ‘Born of a layby’.
Patternicity brings together a collection of works that celebrate pattern. There are a few sculptural works that sit in the space. One is a large floor based work that commands the centre space & a further couple that sit on plinths. Of the two on plinths one even has its own wooden stand. Not at all ground breaking in their display these works by Sheila Hicks & Livia Martin are steeped in traditional sculpture making. Hicks showing a woven material form on a stick attached to its own wooden block. The kind of thing we know from sculptures such as Henry Moore or Barbara Hepworth, who, alongside their larger works we see an archive of sterile, collectable, domestically proportioned sculpture. This small study is a contrast to what you might imagine when thinking about Shelia Hicks’ work. Often her work is large scale, room filling, bright soft forms.
In the other gallery at the Exeter Phoenix is a sculpture sitting directly on the ground, a large multicoloured, stripey sculpture. Each patch of striped printed plastic is attached to the next with a defining black outline. At the top is an opening that allows the viewers to see the joins & all of the sections pieced together. The scale of this work tells a story that feels new & exciting. 3D printed sculpture is normally fairly practical, geometric or technical in some way & can often be limited to the size of the printer. As this piece is made of lots of smaller prints brought together it opens up the possibilities of scale for printed work. It is also very descriptive of the process by use of colour & texture. It is clear to see the printing process & the changes that are made to alter each piece making this work less about the practicalness & innovation of 3D printers but more about how the process can be manipulated as it prints.
Around the corner in the small window gallery is a sculptural form called ‘Mute Idol’ by Donna Mitchell, a friend & contemporary that I have had the pleasure of studying with. This work is part of an ongoing series called ‘Born of a layby’. Having learned about Donna’s working process I could make an educated guess that the materials for this piece will have been found in some remote part of Dartmoor or rural Devon or reclaimed from a recycling center or scrap yard. It is likely furniture padding or some kind of abandoned domestic item. The journey from its source to the gallery will have been labour intensive & lots of care would have been put into its transformation. Tailoring can be seen & the mix of materials play with each other. There is an outer form that is concealing a material that looks to be stretched over coils or springs. This reveal is presented by speckled green lapels & a collar. This could be a bust, there is a suggestion of the human form but its not totally clear. Similar to Shelia Hicks work in the next gallery, this work has that block shape at its base, acting to elevate the work. However this is of the same material & doesn’t differentiate between ‘The work’ & ‘The plinth’ dispite acting in the same way. In addition to that there are two small blocks under the work propping it up. Similar to seeing a car jacked up on bricks & its wheels removed these blocks seem less about being a ‘plinth’ & more about protection. Perhaps emulating a desire to keep this work off the floor when it is out in the world or referencing its connection to furniture, where the soft materials are elevated from the ground by structural legs.
There is a lot to think about with this work & in the context of Donna’s wider practice it is rewarding to take the time to find out. DonnaMitchell.co.uk
Moving further South West to Plymouth where The Box has got a show called ‘Breaking the mould: Sculpture by Women since 1945’ there is a world class array of works that fill the ‘middle space’. Shown at The Box’s converted church gallery, St Luke’s & Plymouth University’s Arts institute.
This exhibition has a lot of work so I will focus on my favourites here. Artsist Phyllida Barlow takes the top spot for me. Secretly I think she was the curators favourite too, there were two of her sculptures, one in each gallery & the larger one in St Luke’s took prime spot under the stained glass window. The quality of light was just perfect for Barlow’s work in this space & just stood out.
A large mixed media form balances on the edge of a wooden platform. Unfinished materials are stacked on a base with legs. It captures the shape of a heap that is at the point of collapse, this work could slide to the ground at any point. The wooden deck provides a perfect counter balance, low to the ground & wide it seems to support the leaning tower of pieces. In contrast the wooden deck is painted in a complimentary pallet of colours & has a considered finish. It is more orderly & functional. This work is exactly what we come to expect from Phyllida Barlow, it is clearly hand made & low-fi but on a scale just large enough that its hard to believe. Its hard to say more than that why her work is hard to believe, but if you have ever seen her work in person you might know what I mean. It makes me feel like a child or at least small. The materials are easy to understand & you can see how its made. Its intellectual without being academic.
The smaller sculpture in the Lewinsky gallery has the same premise & too looks to be ready to slide to the ground. In some ways this work looks like a traditional plinth that has be bisected by some wooden boards, the top part separated from the base in a deliberate act. This work looks less organic than the other & for me makes a statement about the display of sculpture. The patriarchal plinth is severed in half & sculpture is set free to sit on the ground.
This exhibition also shows work by Cornelia Parker, Rachel Whiteread & Sarah Lucas, three more powerhouses in contemporary sculpture. Each bringing their signature style to the show.
I was particularly taken by Rachel Whiteread’s resin blocks. Their translucence & colour created a beautiful light witin the work. They were both solid & ephemeral. These architectural elements seem to be part of something larger as they could be the building blocks for something bigger. They are perhaps a study of the fabric of our built environment. They reference the details we might see on neoclassical galleries & museums. Like the destroyed plinth work across the space, these blocks could be referencing the dismantling of a traditional, formal art space that has historically been pioneered by white western men.
Across the city centre at KARST was an exhibition by Euphrosyne Andrews called ‘Soft edges, Draw close’. A series of works filled the gallery, inside & out on the theme of curtains & concealment.
Athough this show had several more obvious sculptural/installation works the one that gave me the goosebumps was this work, ‘Private Bouquet’ 2022. It was the first work I saw from this show a month before I visited. It was an Instagram post by someone else & as soon as I saw it, I had to see it for myself.
At first glance it doesnt seem like a sculpture & in many ways it isn’t. But it certainly uses a sculptural element that that brings it into the space & offers a bridge from the wall. The wall based part is a beautiful inkjet image of a bouquet of flowers with a small IKEA assembly style diagram of plants in a frame. Hanging from the ceiling a few inches in front of colourful flowers is a piece of reeded glass. This suspended element brings in everything you need. The sculpture. The curtain. The intrigue. Voyeurism. Distortion. Movement. Modernist design. Really wonderful.
Standing before this work the glass distorts the image into a blurry mix of colours regulated by lines. As you move across its face the image changes. It is possible to peek behind the glass but the gap only allows a side view of the flowers so it can never be fully seen. This partial view of the image is satisfying as we still get to enjoy one of the fundamental features of a bouquet of flowers, the colour. The detail of this flower arrangement is lost & replaced by a new form that disperses the shapes that we know as petals or leaves into a blur.
Finally in this round up is studio KIND. in North Devon with work by Louise Hall at her exhibition ‘Remembering Histories’ where she shows soft sculpture in a pile on the floor. The use of a pile here to display work is quite literally used to confront the value of black bodies. Louise says about her work, ‘The discussion on themes of Black bodies taking up physical space and how we represent accumulative trauma and our voices in a political landscape which continues to gaslight Black communities.’
The choice to show work in this way is a powerful use of formal display. Gone is any kind of separation between the work & the ground or careful hanging to show off the hours of work that has gone into each piece. This is sculpture making a political statement through its presence on the ground.
Some of these exhibitions will be finished by the end of the second week of June 2022, so you have probably missed them but the work at Exeter Phoenix is still in the galleries until the end of June.