A 13-year-old Elisabeth Frink was walking along the coast in Exmouth with school friends, when machine-gunned German warplanes descended, dropping bombs above her head. Torn so violently from childhood, the traumatic encounter left an ineradicable impression on Frink.
The memory of personal and collective trauma – the Second World War, the hydrogen bomb – would preoccupy Frink in her work as a sculptor over 40 years, in more than 400 sculptures she produced (she only had an assistant once, to complete her last and largest work, The Welcoming Christ at Liverpool Cathedral). She is perhaps, Britain’s most successful underrated artist, but now, her work is beginning to receive the recognition and study it deserves.
Installation view of 'Elisabeth Frink: Transformation'.
'Perhaps it’s difficult to talk about the things humans are capable of, but if you mix man with beast, you can start to address some of those thoughts in a more compelling way,' says Annette Ratuszniak, curator of the Frink Estate, who worked closely with Hauser & Wirth Somerset's Senior Director, Alice Workman to put together the first major exhibition of the artist’s work in the UK, at Hauser & Wirth Somerset, close to Frink’s Dorset home and studio where she worked up until her death in 1993.
Focused on the early period of her work – sculptures and sketches from the 1950s and 1960s – the exhibition touches on the cathartic nature of the process of sculpting, and brings together some of Frink’s motifs: birds and bird-like figures, eyes and heads. Imposing, dark and heavy looking, it’s hard to imagine that these works were produced at the time the world went pop.
Elisabeth Frink and 'Tribute Heads' in her Southwark studio, 1975
Yet Frink wasn’t really an 'age of anxiety' artist. Her son, Lin Jammet, who also collaborated on the exhibition, remembers his mother as a 'natural socialite', a joyful person who frequented Finch’s, a popular drinking hole for artists on the Fulham Road in the 1960s, 'a proper pub with sawdust on the floor, the sweet aroma of ale and tobacco bellowing out every time someone entered or came out.'
Through sculpture, Frink imagined all forms – human and animal – as malleable, bringing about transformations through plaster. In reshaping the world in her studio, she also saw the vulnerability of the human form – relevant in our tumultuous times, just as much as it was in Frink’s own.
Frink created 400 sculptures in her 40 year career
Man meets beast in her visceral works
Frink imagined all forms as malleable, bringing about transformations through plaster
The exhibition also features early sketches from the 1950s and 1960s
INFORMATION
’Transformation’ is on view until 7 May. For more information, visit the Hauser & Wirth website
ADDRESS
Hauser & Wirth Somerset
Durslade Farm
Dropping Lane
Bruton
Somerset BA10 0NL
-
Gucci’s ‘Design Ancora’ reimagines furniture classics in rich redGucci launches new editions of Italian design icons in an alluring deep red, showcased during Milan Design Week 2024
-
Loewe’s Jonathan Anderson drafts artists to create 24 extraordinary lamps at Milan Design Week 2024Loewe creative director Jonathan Anderson commissioned international artists and artisans to explore ‘illumination within the house’ with a series of lamps and lighting installations, shown at a group exhibition at Milan Design Week 2024
-
What are polynucleotides? Trying the skin injectable made from salmon spermPolynucleotides are the latest in skin injectables, containing DNA derived from the gonads of salmon. Wallpaper* Beauty & Grooming Editor Hannah Tindle tries them to discover exactly how they work
-
Who is the future of British art? Hauser & Wirth Somerset finds out‘Present Tense’ at Hauser & Wirth Somerset showcases some of Britain’s most exciting emerging talents with a group show of 23 artists
-
Peter Blake’s sculptures spark joy at Waddington Custot in London‘Peter Blake: Sculpture and Other Matters’, at London's Waddington Custot, spans six decades of the artist's career
-
Oozing, squidgy, erupting forms come alive at Hayward Gallery‘When Forms Come Alive: Sixty Years of Restless Sculpture’ at Hayward Gallery, London, is a group show full of twists and turns
-
Avery Singer considers 9/11 trauma and corporate anonymity at Hauser & Wirth‘Avery Singer: Free Fall’ opens at Hauser & Wirth, London, melding a serene office aesthetic with moments of horror
-
Frieze London 2023: what to see and doEverything you want to see at Frieze London 2023 and around the city in our frequently updated guide
-
New glass sculpture creates a verdant wonderland at Apple’s Cupertino HQ‘Mirage’ at Apple Park is the work of Zeller & Moye and artist Katie Paterson, a shimmering array of glass columns that snakes through the grounds of the company’s monumental HQ
-
Man Ray’s sculptures go on show in New York‘Man Ray: Other Objects’ opens at Luxembourg + Co, New York, revealing their author’s ‘artistic revolution’
-
Hospital Rooms and Hauser & Wirth unite for a sensorial London exhibition and auctionHospital Rooms and Hauser & Wirth are working together to raise money for arts and mental health charities
