Univerzita Trnavská univerzita

Fakulta Pedagogická fakulta

Katedra Katedra pedagogiky výtvarného umenia
Študijný program Pedagogika výtvarného umenia
Stupeň štúdia Mgr.
Ročník 2
Školský rok 2021/2022
Semester ZS
Názov predmetu Kritické písanie v anglickom jazyku
Pedagóg Mgr. Silvia Lacková Čúzyová, PhD.
Študent Valéria Šebová

ANTONY GORMLEY

Figure 1. Antony Gormley by the construction of Angel of the North, 1998

Sir Antony Gormley, British artist born in 1950, is best known for his figurative sculptures
from which the monumental work Angel of the North (it is 20 m high and 54 m long) is probably
the most famous one.
Gormley sees his body as a thing, that he just happened to inhabit so he treats it as a found
object. He uses the shape of body as a subject, tool, or material which he can observe and analyze
from the inside. He begins with only one form from which he works through multiple variations
changing the amount, size, placement, and stylization. His pieces intend to drag the viewer into
them by stepping to their space or just by simply walking around them what makes the spectator
a part of the work.
Gormley’s oeuvre often maneuvers between installation and environment, he creates space
or even architecture that is supposed to change the state of consciousness of its viewer. His work
is influenced by his interest in anthropology, Buddhist philosophy, universe, and science. When
talking about his inspiration, Gormley often mentions his fascination by the dark limitless space
behind human eyes where the consciousness lies. He also states, that one of his strongest life
experience that made a powerful impression on him and that eventually became the leitmotif for
his work was his trip to India when he was 19 years old. While visiting the country he saw station
crowded with people lying on the floor, covered with blankets. From his point of view, this scenery
resembled to shell like abstract sculptures and led him to creating his first sculptures. Place of
human in the society and relationship between body and built environment are still the subject of
his exploration.

Figure 2. Field for British Isles, detail

Collaborative project with communities from different parts of the world (family of brick
makers from San Matias, Cholula, Mexico - American Field, brick making company from St.
Helen, Merseyside and Ibstock called Field for British Isles, Ostra Grevie, Sweden called
European Field, Porto Velho, Brazil called Amazonian Field, ) called Field is a sculptural group
made out of clay.
 Figure 3. Making od Asian Field, 2003
Participants of all genders, age and societies are given simple instructions: the pieces are
supposed to be hand sized, easy to hold, eyes must be holes pressed into the material and the head
should be proportioned to the body. Field usually consists of couple of ten thousand (biggest one
is Asian Field from 2003 made out of 210 000 sculptures) of figures, with the height variating
from 8 to 26 cm.

Figure. 4 Asian Field, 2003

Used clay usually comes from the location near the community that engages in the project.
After the modelling is finished, they are dried in the sun and baked in brick kiln. When put on a
display, the small sculptures stand side by side filling up the whole floor of particular room (or
more rooms) always facing the visitor. This set-up might get the viewer a feeling of accidentally
walking up on stage with the audience staring at him.

Figure 5. European Field, 1997

The process of creating these small sculptures is repetitive and can evoke breathing or a
heartbeat and the action of transforming a pile of soil to a unique body with consciousness in its
eyes can be even found meditative and also atavistic. Field is about collective work and collective
future and our responsibility for it. Gormley describes his intentions: I wanted the art to look back
at us, its makers (and later viewers) as if we were responsible, responsible for the world that it
(field) an we were in. Gormley was awarded the Turner prize for Field for the British Isles in 1994.
 Figure 6. Another place, 1997
Another place is a sculptural group consisting of 100 cast figures made from iron installed
on the length of almost 5 km and about 1,5 km from the shore to the sea. Altogether there are 23
types of casts of artists’ body. The artist describes the sculptures as records of real body in real
time and the process of casting as trying to evoke a feeling and translating it into a body posture,
then holding it by a will until the material is settled and the body is stuck in the newly created
space. Resulting sculptures seem similar, but there are differences in posture (sometimes they are
more relaxed and others more tense) and the extent of chest (in which are lungs inflated more or
less). For the first time, the sculptures were installed in 2005 on Crosby Beach, which is around
11 km far from Liverpool. This piece was nicknamed “The Iron Men” by locals and sometimes
the communities dress these sculptures for fun or for celebration of culture.
Sculptures are looking to the west, wondering what is on the other side of the horizon.
Composition is supposed to be a reminder of people leaving Europe during the rise of national
socialism emigrating to America and this motive is designated in the title. Originally, the work
meant to be installed in Germany.
 Figure 7. individual sculptures from Another place
At some point, the piece acquires the quality of processual art when used material reacts to
the environment and the weather.

Figure 8. Event horizon, London, 2007

 Next work shares same visual language as Another place – it shows group of casts of the
artist, but now in more artificial environment. Event Horizon consists of 31 life-sized sculptures
made from iron and fiberglass commissioned by London’s Hayward Gallery in 2007. Gormley
says that: “the title originates from cosmological physics and refers to the boundary of the
observable universe. because the universe is expanding, there are objects that will never be visible,
as their light will never reach us.” The sculptures were put on display in different cities (London
in 2007, Rotterdam in 2008, New York in 2010, Sao Paulo and Rio de Janeiro in 2012, Hong Kong
in 2015) usually on the rooftops and few of them in the streets, but always close enough to see at
least 3 of them from one point of view. Gormleys intention was to play with the city and perception
of its habitants.

Figure 9. individual sculpture from Event horizon

Apart from people looking up and pointing their fingers to the sky, the installation caused
very intense reactions. After their placement in Hong Kong in 2015, the local police received
numerous calls from worried people, who thought they saw suicide attempts. In Hong Kong its not
rare, annually around 500 people decide to end their life by jumping off building. This is actually
the reason why was the installation cancelled the first time in 2014 when an investment banker
jumped from the bank’s headquarters.
 Figure 10. Cave, 2019
27 tons of steel called Cave is inspired by artists visit to an actual prehistoric cave while
making a document produced by BBC called HOW ART BEGAN. From the point of view of a
visitor, it might look like a pile of cuboids, that are filling up the whole space of one of the
museums exhibitions rooms. But in fact, this seemingly disorganized mass is once again a human
body.

Figure 11. entrance to Cave

The hollow, shell-like form gives the visitor two options – to enter the dark interior weakly
illuminated by a few stripes of light coming from outside or if don’t feel like it, use the small space
to walk along the sculpture squeezed between the Cave and the rooms walls.
 Figure 12. Blind light, 2007
Blind light can be described as architecture within architecture. Commissioned for
exhibition in London’s Hayward Gallery, this piece is a room made from glass filled with thick
artificial mist and illuminated with bright white light. It is a disorienting environment which made
its participant euphoric or paranoid. After visitor entered the room and immersed to the undefined
space, the conditions disabled their visual senses. Once they found themselves in the vapor, they
couldn’t see their stretched arms in front of them, part of their bodies disappeared. The piece
brought up unintentional social interaction - while wandering around with arms stretched visitors
most likely touched someone’s shoulder or even face of a stranger by accident. At some point
people got to the glass walls which defined room and could navigate themselves out again.
 Figure 12. Blind light, 2007
Blind Light shows ambivalence of seeing: visitors interacting with the environment don’t
see each other, they barely see their own limbs. And then there are the spectators of the
environment from the outside, who can see lost shadows pressed against the glass.
SOURCES
https://www.antonygormley.com/
https://news.artnet.com/art-world/antony-gormley-event-horizon-hong-kong-354128
https://elephant.art/antony-gormley-blind-light/
https://www.sefton.gov.uk/around-sefton/another-place-by-antony-gormley.aspx
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=yBK4RBRj1U8&t=12s
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vJ66jv8ICjc&t=31s
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0lc1gGAox5I
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=DqHOOOqN4_U&ab_channel=ThaddaeusRopac