For this artist’s talk, hosted by the Sculptural Processes Group (SPG), Alison Wilding RA will discuss her abstract sculptural work, which ranges across media and materials. After graduating from the Royal College of Art, London in 1973, Wilding’s work was included in a number of important group shows of the new British sculpture then beginning to emerge. Wilding is known in particular for her innovative use of contrasting materials, often pairing forms in precarious juxtapositions and balancing acts. Recent works combine string, steel and hair, mirrored glass, silicone rubber, alabaster, sand, and painted foam. Often her works sit directly on the floor, or appear propped against a wall. Smaller works appear balanced on tabletops or on the floor. Frequent lurches in scale punctuate Wilding’s work. From the small tabletop sculptures reminiscent of early dada objects to the large, multi-part environments and major outdoor installations, from things you hold to those that expand to fill your field of vision. While at college Wilding experimented with installation, and while she turned increasingly toward three-dimensions, her work has never lost sight of questions of environment and placement – whether a publicly commissioned work out doors, or a sculpture arranged on a gallery floor.
Alison Wilding was born in 1948 and currently lives and works in London. Having studied at Nottingham College of Art, Nottingham; Ravensbourne College of Art and Design, Bromley; and the Royal College of Art, London; Wilding’s first major solo exhibition was held at the Serpentine Gallery, London, in 1985. Notable awards include a Henry Moore Fellowship at the British School at Rome (1988); the Joanna Drew Travel Bursary (2007); The Paul Hamlyn Foundation Award (2008) and Bryan Robertson Award (2012). Wilding was nominated for the Turner Prize in both 1988 and 1992, and was elected to the Royal Academy in 1999. In 2013 Alison Wilding has a solo exhibition in the Duveen Gallery, Tate Britain and in May 2017 an exhibition Alison Wilding: Sculpture opens at Offer Watermann.
The Sculptural Processes Group is an informal study group that was set up in October 2007 to facilitate exchanges between researchers, curators, conservators and students. As part of our year-long focus on ‘Finish’, the esteemed British artist Alison Wilding RA will be discussing her own sculptural practice.