Talk

Conrad Shawcross RA

Friday 19 June 2015 6.30 - 7.30pm

Reynolds Room, Burlington House, Royal Academy of Arts

£16 (includes exhibition entry). £12 (event only). Concessions available.

Friends of the RA book first

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Summer Exhibition 2015

Go to the exhibition

Sculptor Conrad Shawcross RA joins writer and Coordinating Chaplain at Nottingham Trent University, Revd Dr Richard Davey to discuss his courtyard installation for this year’s Summer Exhibition, and the way his sculptures explore geometry, philosophy, physics and metaphysics.

In this event, sculptor Conrad Shawcross talks to Richard Davey about his installation for the 2015 Summer Exhibition, The Dappled Light of the Sun. This large-scale work consists of a group five steel ‘clouds’ made up of thousands of tetrahedrons, the smallest of the Platonic Solids. The branching forms stand at over six metres high in the RA’s Courtyard and weigh five tonnes each.

Elected in 2013, Conrad Shawcross RA is the youngest current Royal Academician. His recent works include Timepiece, a spectacular mechanical light sculpture at the Roundhouse in Camden, ADA Project, a robotic installation inspired by Ada Lovelace at The Vinyl Factory in 2014 and a new series of sculptures in Dulwich Park unveiled this April.

In this event he will discuss how he approached the 2015 Summer Exhibition courtyard installation and how scale, failed theories and architectural space all influence his practice.

£16 (includes exhibition entry). £12 (event only). Concessions available.

Friends of the RA book first

Join now

Summer Exhibition 2015

Go to the exhibition

The Greeks considered the tetrahedron to represent the very essence of matter. In this huge work I have taken this form as my ‘brick’ and from this I have grown these chaotic bifurcating forms that will float above the heads of all that walk beneath. I am extremely excited to see the completed work exhibited for the first time in the RA’s historic Annenberg Courtyard, for which it was conceived

Conrad Shawcross

The making of Conrad Shawcross RA's 'The Dappled Light of the Sun'

The sculptures of Conrad Shawcross RA explore subjects that lie on the borders of geometry and philosophy, physics and metaphysics. For the 2015 Summer Exhibition's Annenberg Courtyard installation, Shawcross has created a large-scale, immersive work consisting of five steel, cloud-like forms. These are made from thousands of tetrahedrons and stand at over six metres high and weigh five tonnes each.