Benedict Carpenter

Commissioned by the Jerwood Foundation in 2001

Ragley Hall, Warwickshire (2001 to present).

Generally the sculpture is in good overall condition. The patina is worn in places and there are spots of staining and debris, consistent with the piece being exhibited outdoors. Please telephone the department on +44 207 293 6424 if you have any questions regarding the present lot.
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Benedict Carpenter won the first Jerwood Sculpture prize with his proposal for the present work in 2001. His large scale sculptures are very much concerned with the engagement and relationship between the piece and the viewer; his works changd and morphe as one moves around them, creating different sculptural and formal effects. As the artist recalls:

'All of my work is either implicitly or explicitly collaborative - it is like a game: rigorous and rewarding for me; enjoyable and provocative for you. But to have any meaning, both sides must be equally involved. I take responsibility for creating the structure; within the structure, you are free to move at will.' (The Artist, 2005, quoted on http://www.thecentreofattention.org/exhibitions/venicebc.html )

Universal Object certainly has biomorphic and anthropomorphic resonances, particularly calling to mind the jelly like forms found in the underwater world. While marine life has fascinated Carpenter since he was a child, he resists categorising the work, as its interpretation is meant to be malleable. A visual Rorschach test, the squirming, bulging, rippling and gesturing form generates a certain uncertainty in the viewer. Universal Object is certainly playful, yet Carpenter is also influenced by Hans Bellmer's Surrealist dolls, ghastly in their fragmentation, in their seemingly random recombination of flesh. As he suggests: 'If you take a doll apart it becomes analogous to clay - a kind of fingerprint of horror. Being a sculptor is such a perverse activity, but I'm fascinated by it.'