Marcus Harvey’s ambiguous new sculptures

Associated media

25 October – 3 December 2012

Other Criteria is presenting a new series of sculptural works by Marcus Harvey, to be launched at their New Bond Street gallery on 25 October 2012.

Harvey’s sculptures are assembled of cast archaeological objects, masks and portraits of characters inspired by an array of British history-mythology. The works on display, including Hatshepsut (2012, pictured), playfully question our knowledge and perception of history and are flavoured by satirists from George Cruikshank to contemporary political cartoonists.

The exhibition will include works of glazed stoneware and a unique direct wax-cast bronze sculpture. The direct wax cast process involves modelling wax in the way Harvey typically squeezes and presses clay for his ceramic sculpture. The wax is then directly cast in bronze, bypassing the mould-making procedure, with the hope of preserving the spontaneity of the clay work.

In this series, Harvey forges motifs and emblems of Britishness into collaged portraits of historical British figures or foes from history, from Nelson to Margaret Thatcher and from Napoleon to Tony Blair. He works the imagery, handling the clay in a battle to find its form, before subjecting the sculpture to multiple firings and glazes. The result is tough but humorous sculpture, unapologetic and brash, political yet ambiguous, considered and painterly.
 

Marcus Harvey

Marcus Harvey makes highly worked figurative paintings and sculptures. He seeks out imagery that is emblematic of a brutish but proud Britishness. Often his imagery is problematic or controversial, his most infamous work perhaps being Myra which was exhibited as part of the Royal Academy’s ground-breaking exhibition ‘Sensation’in 1997. Unprecedented national and international media attention ensued as the painting had been created with repeated child’s handprints in the image of the infamous child-murderer Myra Hindley. This chilling painting derived much of its potency from the iconography of photographic image so engrained in the British psyche through years of obsessive media reproduction.

Another early image source for Harvey was pornographic magazines, which was the inspiration for the series ‘Readers Wives’. Since 2000, Harvey has created a series of door-panel paintings, which depict domestic vignettes in a way that mimics the distorting effect of patterned glass.

Having concentrated on figurative painting for most of his career, Harvey has recently turned to sculpture, producing work that maintains the same playfully provocative style of his paintings.
Harvey was born in Leeds in 1963. He currently lives and works in London.

Harvey is the co-founder of Turps Banana, a magazine devoted to painting and written by painters.

Other Criteria

Launched in 2005, Other Criteria is a publishing company owned by Damien Hirst and directed by Hugh Allan, with creative director Jason Beard. Evolving from their website, the company opened shop fronts in London on New Bond St (October 2008) and Hinde St (February 2009). Collaborating closely with established and emerging artists, the shops pride themselves on displaying ‘great quality art by the best artists and making it available to everyone.