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Born in Newlyn into a family of studio potters, Tom Leaper developed his own artistic style while working in the pottery before going on to study sculpture. He’s worked in Cornwall for the past 35 years and its culture and landscape imbues all that he creates. Tom’s practice involves large scale public projects and private commissions alongside his studio work. Being involved in his community is very important; Leaper has worked closely with local charities and organisations, firmly feeling that art is for all to enjoy.

Tom is highly skilled in metalwork, particularly bronze and stainless steel. He has also embraced cutting-edge design processes and media such as fibreglass and Jesmonite. Alongside using drone site-mapping and AutoCAD design, Tom 3D scan his handmade works, which are then digitally enlarged and milled before being cast. This allows him to retain the inherent organic qualities of hand-formed sculpture at an impressive scale.

Tom’s Jesmonite pieces are at once striking and oddly harmonious.
 His practice is uplifting; he believes artwork can have a profound effect on people without being serious in tone or political in subject. He is drawn to organic shapes as more expressive in their simplicity than complicated, figurative designs. He selects bright colours that contrast the natural forms. This playful juxtaposition is used to enhance the power of the shape where a muted palette would dull it.

Ultimately Tom’s work offers the viewer a subtle, thoughtful experience. He doesn’t ask them to wrestle with difficult concepts but rather to be heartened and in this pleasing engagement reflect more deeply.

For the most up to date information regarding Tom’s work, look at his Facebook page or follow him on Instagram @ tom_leaper.

Timeline

1981 Falmouth Art College Foundation
1982/1984 Manchester University Fine Art Sculpture B.A Arts with hons
1985/1988 Assitant sculptor to David Kemp, sculptures include The Navigators Hayes Galleria, The Ancient Forrester Grizedale,Transformers Sunderland
1986/1987 Raku Sculpture
1988/1994 mixed and solo shows Gallery Tresco
1994 Men in Ore, landscape sculpture Geevor Tin Mines
1995 The Flight of Cornish Industry landscape Sculpture Geevor
1995 Shoal stainless steel sculpture Tresco
1997 The Agave Fountain Tresco Abbey Gardens
1997/1999 mi9xed and solo exhibitions
1999 The Magnolia Fountain Trewithen Gardens
1999 The Millenium Fountain Settrington House
2001 The Camilla Fountain Faro
2002 Scallop Founatains Settrington House
2003 Focal Point Hell Bay Hotel Isles of Scilly
2003 Newlyn Heritage Trail Markers
2004 Camillia Fountain Huystins Weybridge
2005 Magnolia Fountain Arley Hall
2005 Mousehole heritage markers
2005 Tresco Garden Arches Tresco
2006 Oval Form Tresco
2006 Sail Tresco
2007 The Newlyn Fiserman Memorial
2008/2009 Lead artist Penzance town Regeneration scheme
2010 Cube Tresco Abbey Gardens
2010 St Julias Hospice GHarden Design
2011 flooating Cube Tresco Abbey Gardens
2012 The Ludlow Angel
2012 Frampton Court Sculpture Show
2013 Sun and Sail Mousehole
2013 Islands of Colour St Just Airport
2014 Greebes Penwith Gallery
2014 Stacking Frosts no 38 bristol
2015 gold Cube no 38 Bristol
2016/17 Floral Sculpture bronze settrington House
2018 Jesmonite sculptures/ Private Red
2019 Nyne Gallery London, sculpture exhibition
2019 Agent Orange Tremenheere Sculpture Gardens
2019 Mayflower Heritage Trail Dartmouth

Excited by what he thought might be an open ended way of life, Richard went to Corsham, (Bath Academy of Art) in 1975 to study sculpture. He was not disappointed!

Now over forty years on with several decades of major Public art, exhibitions and experimental artworks, in different mediums, behind him he is still exploring the same creative freedom.

His current work is free-form often in steel  teetering on the edge of becoming Installation Art as the journey unfolds. The work is dynamic animated and abstract. He was recently encouraged by winning the Roy Rasmussen Award at a mixed exhibition of the Free Painters and Sculptors (FPS) in London.

He says “Creating artworks and sculpture is an amazing way of keeping track of time; in pictures!”

You can find Richard’s website at richardfarrington.com.

Paul Harvey has sold work all over the world as well as to the Royal family, and has exhibited at Chelsea flower show on many occasions. His studio is set in the middle of the Hampshire countryside, on the edge of a half-acre pond/lake, which over the past ten years he with his wife have turned into a small nature reserve, which in turn has encouraged many of the birds he sculpts to show themselves in their true and natural light.

Paul has been sculpting since the age of ten, having been introduced to woodcarving by a primary school teacher in West Sussex in the early seventies.

Birds being an interest from an early age, having kept numerous species as pets in aviaries, he was keen to carve them in wood, birds however with their delicate features didn’t lend themselves to woodcarving, so the design had to be simplified – a style that combined with his other great interest Art Deco, forms his work today, even though now working in bronze gives an almost unlimited freedom in design.

He produces two collections of birds, one made at his studio in Burghclere using resins, marble and metals, and a bronze collection cast by the Pangolin foundry.

For more information, visit www.paulharveysculpture.co.uk.

Patrick trained at the, now defunct, Bath Academy of Art which was set amongst the rolling hills of North Wiltshire close to the Bath Stone quarries. Whilst at Bath Academy he started to carve stone. After a winter at the Cyprus college of Art he started to exhibit in galleries, mainly in Bath and London. Over the years he has exhibited in many galleries in England and abroad and work has been sold all over the world. In 1997 he was elected as a Member of the Royal Society of Sculptors and is also a member of South-west sculptors.

After many years working as an Art Director in the advertising industry, in London, New York and  Stockholm, Mike decided to pursue a more satisfying life and moved to Dorset to study stone carving.

Opening his own studio in 1996 he successfully competed for a commission to carve the Christ Child which can be found at the entrance to St Martin in the fields church in London.

Since then Mike has enjoyed an interesting and varied career as a sculptor and painter, his most recent commission being a peace memorial entitled “All you need is love” for his home town of Dorchester.

For more information, visit www.mikechapmansculptor.com.

Mike Long is British Artist currently living in the South West of France where he has his studio.

After graduating from Goldsmiths in London in the early seventies he became Head of Art at King Edward VI in Southampton before moving to France. Last year Mike presented the school with an impressive bronze War memorial to commemorate the centenary of the end of WW1. It is the centrepiece of their memorial garden.

The strong, sensual athletic form coupled with a long time interest in anatomy and movement has always been at the heart of Mike’s sculptures.

Time spent with the London Contemporary Dance and Ballet Rambert have helped inspire his interest in traditional figurative sculpture born over fifty years ago whilst studying at Goldsmiths.

Mike’s work has been exhibited at several London Galleries including the Portman Gallery and the Century Gallery as well as a number of Galleries across the United States. For a number of years he exhibited at the New London Theatre, Drury Lane whilst the stage musical Cats’ was on and featured in a BBC documentary ‘Artbeat’.

The two pieces currently on exhibition here at the Cotswold Sculpture Park, ‘Arc’ and ‘ Balance ‘ are Mike’s most recent sculptures to be cast in bronze, and he is currently working on other pieces in the ‘Arc’  series.

For more information, visit www.mikelongsculptor.com.

Melissa Cole is a bronze medal holder and Fellow of The Worshipful Company of Blacksmiths (WFCB). She is internationally recognised for the craftsmanship of her hand-forged ironwork.

Melissa’s work ranges for commissioned gates and railings to sculptures and fine art installations. She combines contemporary design with forged and fabricated metal for public spaces, private gardens and interiors.

Melissa has been featured on Channel 4’s ‘Grand Designs’, BBC’s ‘Escape to The Country’ and ‘Country File’ and Radio 4 Woman’s Hour.

Her work has been described as;
”Metal work that flows and wraps around itself, taking your eyes on a journey producing pieces that are solid in make up but light and free in their aesthetic quality.”

Based near Marlborough in the Pewsey Vale, Wiltshire, Melissa’s sculptural work is informed and inspired by her rural surroundings. Sculptures based on the topography and landscape of Wiltshire evoke the organic forms of rolling downs.
Small and delicate pieces often worked in series or as cast limited editions are inspired by natural elements discovered in the Savernake Forest or whilst riding the local bridleways.

Melissa works to commission with private clients, community and corporate projects producing architectural elements, sculptures and site specific sculptural pieces from forged steel and mixed metals. She also runs blacksmithing and sculptural metalwork courses from her forge in Wiltshire.

Public commissions by Melissa can be seen in Chippenham, Plymouth, Swindon and three independent sculpture commissions in Oxford, one of which is a large scale depiction of the river Cherwell wrapping around a new student accommodation building.

2018 works include a DNA based large-scale sculpture for Winchester University, and a sculpture for the new Athelstan Museum in Malmesbury, Wiltshire.

Find out more at 
www.melissacole.co.uk.

Louise Plant studied sculpture with the Open College of the Arts in 1992, whilst working full time as a teacher. Leaving teaching in 1994, Louise continued to study and make sculpture. She was elected Member of the Royal Society of Sculptors in 2003 and became Fellow in 2014.

Louise has exhibited widely including MOCA, Cheeseburn Grange, Asthall Manor, New Walk Museum and Art Gallery, the Usher and Wysing Arts. Awards include the Brian Mercer Scholarship, Studio Sem, Italy, the KKV Bohuslän Scholarship, Sweden and the Year of the Artist Award, Arts Council England.

Held in private collections globally, her work is also owned by the MOD Northwood, the RNIB Loughborough, Durham County Council, Somerset County Council and the Waldorf Astoria Bangkok.

Find out more at louiseplant.com.

Originally from Sheffield, Jill currently works and lives in Cullercoats, Tyne and Wear. Having previously gained a first-class Honours degree in Fine Art from Glasgow School of Art she obtained a Master’s degree in Fine Art, with Distinction, from Sunderland University in 2013.

Jill has exhibited large scale works at Wollombi Sculpture Trail, NSW, Australia, in Denton, Texas, USA and in galleries throughout the U.K. Jill has developed a research based practice centred on the architectural technique of fabric forming. Jill was awarded membership of Royal Society of British Sculptors in February 2018.

Drawing on physical structures, environmental forms and observed human shape, the work is rooted in a consideration of complex human and environmental issues that face us in a rapidly changing and challenging world.  The work considers both Emic and Etic issues – anthropological, social considerations and communication viewed from a female perspective.

The work partakes of a commonality of material and form, and yet each is unique, having their own identity within a space and therefore each piece asks to be regarded separately.

The work is largely research based and is an on-going exploration – an enquiry into how we communicate through our bodies and through language – it is especially relevant at this moment when expressions of identity – personal, national, global are so much a part of cultural conversation.

Find out more at https://www.jillgibson.net/

Jane Clift lives in Dartmouth, Devon, where she makes three dimensional wire sculptures.

Largely self-taught, Jane comes from an artistic family and from an early age had exposure to art and music. She focussed on music which she went on to teach. In her early twenties, Jane won a place in the highly acclaimed National Youth Theatre where she appeared in a number of West End plays and a BBC Play for Today. She then toured the country as stage manager for a one man show, including the Edinburgh Festival where they won Best Fringe Award.

Ten years ago, Jane had a serious accident which required a complete skin graft to her right hand and discovered weaving soft wire a fantastic therapy for regaining dexterity. The goal was to play the piano again, but she discovered a new love!

At this time, Jane launched a new business, “A Vintage Garden” and became known for finding unusual pieces of art for the outdoors. She started making wire sculptures for her garden, and very quickly took commissions. The first sculpture she sold, was to another artist. Jane is inspired by movement, grace and humour.

In 2018, Jane became an Associate Member of the Devon Guild of Craftmen and won the “People’s Choice Award” for her sculpture at the Cockington Sculpture Trail in Torquay. For the last two years, she has exhibited at the Contemporary Craft Fair at Bovey Tracey and many other leading art fairs around the country.

Find out more at janeclift.co.uk.