The UK’s Sculptural Newcomers
by Selma Stern, NY Arts Magazine, Vol. 10 No. 1/2 January/February 2005

Being founded in 1904 and under royal patronage since 1911, London’s Royal British Society of Sculptors (RBS) today is a thriving mix of sculptors ranging from artists at the top of their profession to those at the start of their careers. Each year, the RBS awards ten membership places to outstanding sculptors from all nationalities and working in all styles and media, including installation, site specific, conceptual and video work.

The winners of the last bursary have been Tine Bech, Sidney Brouet, Jenny Dunseath, Brigitte Jurack, Alastair Mackie, Claire Morgan, Sunghoon Son, Akiko & Masako Takada, Keri Townsend and Mhairi Vari.

With her reactive robotic sound sculpture Rain Balloon, the Danish artist Tine Bech, who studied fine art at the Arhus Kunstkole in Denmark and the Surrey Institute of Art and Design University College in Britain, has gained one of the membership awards. Three of her balloons were roaming through the exhibition space when the RBS exposed the winners’ works from 21st October until 3rd December 2004. Bech started developing reactive sculptors as she had come to realize that art is something that should be experienced not only visually and intellectually but with the whole body and all its senses. Bech’s reactive robotic sound balloons encourage people to interact in a somatic and tactile way; they invite to play with them in a physical mode going beyond a merely intellectual appreciation.

Sidney Brouet’s 3 Station Road, an original sash window cast in lead and complete with glass and a preserved remnant of a derelict building, greeted RBS visitors when entering the gallery.
The British sculptor Alastair Mackie, a graduate of the London School of Art who was given the Madame Taussaud’s Award in 1999 and the City & Guilds Sculpture Prize in 2000, has won with his work Mouse Sculls. Mouse Sculls is a three-dimensional ball that resembles the geometrical paintings of Op Art giant Victor Vasarely. In fact, both Vasarely and Mackie who grew up on a farm in Cornwall have transposed forms from nature into purely abstract elements, recognizing the geometry of nature.
Claire Morgan has used the seeds of dandelions in vast multiples for her sculpture Come Fly with Me, forming a free-swinging arrow in the air, creating a meticulous and desperately fragile piece that seemed to barely withstand the breath of a passer by.
The Japanese twins Akiko & Masako Takada collaborated to create Sugar-Scape and Thames Sponge, using a row of plastic bottles containing layers of various sugars and a carefully dissected household sponge to create meticulous miniature landscapes.
In Mhairi Vari’s Shed, the viewer looked down at thousands of pieces of multicolored plasticize that were piled onto a sun lounger from the 70s.
It has been the young talent Claire Morgan who, at the Private View, was granted the Roy Noakes Award. This is a cash prize established in memory of sculptor Roy Noakes by his wife Biddy to promote young sculptors in the early stages of their career.

Each year, the RBS takes applications for the bursary until the end of April.
© Selma Stern 2004