Cutting the Curve

Crafting the Classical Body

January 18th - February 25th 2016

Cut-paper artist Vanessa Stone explores the classical body – its S-curves and rippled muscles, its profiles and rear-views – in this exhibition of custom-made and unique artworks inspired by Greek and Roman sculptures in the Museum's Cast Gallery.

There is something magical about these casts, something just so beautiful about the line of a shoulder, the curve of an arm and the subtle silhouette of a Greek head in profile.

My blade has almost been asking me to cut these lines - to capture them in the simplicity of cut paper.

The pieces in this exhibition are ones that Vanessa Stone has wanted make for many years, collages that translate these casts into layered paper collage. Vanessa uses a scalpel to draw into surface of a piece of paper, cutting away the negative space to bring out the dominant line or shape of the sculptures. She then layers from behind and cuts into those layers and so the process continues. She reduces the casts to abstracted forms, trying to capture the essence of their form and line, and the same sense of balance and sense of presence that the casts carry intrinsically.