Bags of artistic quality on show at Sculpture Park
A nine-foot high handbag is among the new cutting edge exhibits at Yorkshire Sculpture Park.
‘Bag of Aspirations,’ by Greek sculptor Kalliopi Lemos, is a colossal replica of Hermes’ famous Birkin bag, a single accessory which fetches hundreds of thousands of pounds.
The exhibit, forged in 2018, represents materialism and how femininity is defined by restrictive ideals of beauty and behaviour.
This expensive and highly-soughtafter bag has become associated with luxury and exclusivity, embodying the values and desires of a consumer culture.
Fittingly, the work has recently been displayed outside exclusive shops in London’s Mayfair.
Though made of steel, the sculpture skilfully captures the tactile appearance of worn leather. Its folds and creases suggest a remarkable texture and softness, forged from this cold, hard metal.
New at the park for 2021 is the fourmetre-high ‘Monumental Dancer After Degas’ by British artist William Tucker, which captures the muscles and volume of a powerful human figure in movement.
Like many of Tucker’s sculptures, this abstracted body also resembles a huge rock formation and fits perfectly within the park’s natural environment.
And at the formal pond the enigmatic ‘Snowman, two balls twinkle white’ by Gary Hume, has been installed.
Images drawn from childhood, including snowmen, polar bears, rabbits and owls, appear frequently in Hume’s work, suggesting the importance of figurative imagery to the artist’s explorations of structure, surface and colour.
The shape of this work evokes feelings of joy in childhood recollections, while the sculpture’s featureless exterior implies a sense of loss and despair.
Also new for 2021 are two classic pieces by late Yorkshire sculptor Henry Moore – ‘Large Two Forms’ (1966) and ‘Large Spindle Piece’ (1974) – plus ‘From the Sex of Metals IV’ (1990) by the late British artist Edward Allington.