Collector’s Choice I Indoor Sculpture

Roche Court Sculpture Park has a survey of the best of British contemporary sculpture. This week, we are highlighting our beautiful and interesting indoor sculpture, currently displayed in our Artists House and Design House. These works are wonderful additions to any interior space.

Barbara Hepworth
Four Forms, 1974
Brass
34 x 21 x 21 cm
1ft 1 ½ x 8 ¼ x 8 ¼ in.
Edition 0 of 9

Elegantly realised in highly polished bronze, the smooth, elongated forms of Four Forms perfectly capture they key aspects of Barbara Hepworth's pioneering practice. Superbly harmonising tensions between form, volume, abstraction and perspective, this work demonstrates both radical simplicity and sensitivity to balance and materials.

For over two decades the New Art Centre has represented the Barbara Hepworth Estate and has worked closely with the family on a global exhibitions and sales programme. Hepworth’s desire to bring the physicality and vitality of the landscape into her work makes her presence at Roche Court Sculpture Park particularly poignant. Light, form, and space play an iconic role in both the essence of Hepworth’s practice, and the Sculpture Park.

Kenneth Armitage
Bernadette Going to Wales, 1972 (cast 1986)
Aluminium and gloss paint
24.5 x 29 x 9 cm
9 ⅝ x 11 ⅜ x 3 ½ in.
Edition 9 of 9

Kenneth Armitage’s sculpture is known for its certain tongue-in-cheek humour, a quality that is palpable in Bernadette Going to Wales. The table-top work depicts a friend of Armitage’s, the illustrator Bernadette Watts, and alludes to Bernadette moving away to north Wales, striding ahead with determination while the male figures stencilled onto the sheet of aluminium flee hastily in the opposite direction.

Bernadette Going to Wales was produced at an important moment in Armitage’s career in the 1970s, when he began to combine drawing and sculpture. Armitage wrote at the time:

All work now has blown-up images silk-screened or mounted on simple structures or shapes and I find this satisfying – all other works concerned solely with shape, space or structure now look empty or lacking.

Kenneth Armitage (1916-2002) attended Leeds College of Art and was awarded a scholarship to the Slade, London, studying there between 1937-39. His work has been exhibited widely, with his first solo shows at Gimpel Fils, London (1952) and the Bertha Schaefer Gallery, New York (1954). Following this, he has shown at the Musee Nationaled’Art Moderne, Paris, France (1958); the Royal Academy of Arts, London (1996), and at the Yorkshire Sculpture Park, Wakefield (1996).

Bill Woodrow
Clockswarm, 2001
Bronze and Gold leaf
23 x 34.3 x 10 cm
9 x 1ft 1 ½ x 4 in.
Edition of 8

A major figure in British contemporary sculpture, Bill Woodrow’s work embodies themes of humour, human history and narratives. His Swarm Series, informed by his experience of keeping bees in the early 1990s, draws upon the symbiotic relationship between the hive and their human keepers, as well as the life, movement, and activity of the bees.

The smallest of the Swarm Series, Woodrow’s Clockswarm takes the form of a mantel clock. The gilded, frenzied bees coat the shape, leaving only an outline.

Bill Woodrow’s (b. 1948) prolific artistic career began with his first solo exhibition at the Whitechapel Art Gallery, London, in 1972. Further solo exhibitions of his work have since been held at the Tate Gallery, London; the South London Gallery, London; Yorkshire Sculpture Park, Wakefield; Institut Mathildenhöhe, Darmstadt, Germany; the Palacio Nacional de Queluz, Oporto, Portugal. In 2002, he was elected to the Royal Academy of Arts. Bill Woodrow’s work is included in a number of major international public collections, including the Government Art Collection, UK; the Museum of Modern Art, New York, USA; The Museum of Contemporary Art, Chicago, USA; Moderna Museet, Sweden and the Rijksmuseum Kröller-Müller, in the Netherlands.

Reg Butler
Study for Circus, 1959
Signed with artist's monogram and editioned 'RB 7/8' (on base)
Bronze
51.4 x 19.1 x 17.5 cm
1ft 7 ⅞ x 7 ½ x 6 ⅞ in.
Edition 7 of 8

Reg Butler was born in Buntingford, Hertfordshire in 1913. In 1947 he became an assistant to Henry Moore and was appointed a Gregory Fellow in Sculpture at Leeds University from 1950-53 on Moore's recommendation.

His work was included in the Festival of Britain in 1951, and in 1953 he was awarded the Grand Prize in the ‘Unknown Political Prisoner’ Sculpture Competition. He exhibited widely, including at the Venice Biennale in 1952, and a major retrospective at the Tate Gallery in 1983.

Paul Morrison
Topocline, 2005
Painted aluminium
27.5 x 14 x 14 cm
10 ¾ x 5 ½ x 5 ½ in.

Inspired by botanical drawings, animation, historical engravings and Art Nouveau design, Paul Morrison’s work encompasses bold floral visions in the form of largely black and white sculpture, drawing, painting and prints. Topocline depicts a dandelion in painted black aluminium. It exhibits the linear, graphic quality of his painting, and augments our sense of depth and scale as a result.

Paul Morrison (b. 1966) attended Hugh Baird College, Liverpool, before going on to study at Sheffield Polytechnic and Goldsmiths College, London, graduating in 1998. His first solo show was at Habitat, King’s Road, London in 1996. Since, he has many solo exhibitions, including at the Millennium Gallery, Sheffield; Galleria d'Arte Moderna e Contemporanea, Bergamo, Italy; the Irish Museum of Modern Art, Dublin, Ireland and The Hammer Museum, Los Angeles, USA. Paul Morrison’s work can be found in numerous private and public collections, including The British Council Collection, London; the Fitzwilliam Museum, Cambridge; RISD Museum, Rhode Island, USA; the Museum of Modern Art, New York, USA and the Victoria and Albert Museum, London.

Left:
Nina Saunders
Have you seen my keys?, 2006
Bronze
13 x 15 x 3 cm
5 ⅛ x 5 ⅞ x 1 ¼ in.
Edition 2 of 8 + 1 AP

Right:
Nina Saunders
Later that afternoon, 2005
Bronze
7.5 x 19.5 x 17 cm
3 x 7 ⅝ x 6 ¾ in.
Edition 5 of 5

Known for her sculptural transformations of furniture, found objects and textiles with an anthropomorphic quality, Nina Saunders’ work plays with the function of the domestic object. She uses a wide range of materials to create sculpture that is humorous, contemplative, and acts to subvert our interpretation of the world around us.

Nina Saunders was born in Odense, Denmark in 1958. Following her studies at Central St Martin’s London, she has exhibited widely, including at the Venice Biennale (2009); the Victoria and Albert Museum (2010); and at the Hermès flagship stores in Dubai (2017), Los Angeles (2016) and New York (2015). In June 2025, she will exhibit a large installation for Platform Bunker at Copenhagen Art Week.