Table of Contents

Preface • 1. Bodies in Space • 2. Off the Wall • 3. Mounds, Fields & Standing Stones • 4. Trees & Life • 5. Light & Darkness • 6. Clay & Modelling • 7. Voids • 8. The Body & the Block • 9. The Age of Bronze • 10. Bodies & Buildings • 11. The Colossus & the Slave • 12. Time & Mortality • 13. Drapery & Anatomy • 14. Actions & Events • 15. Fear & Fetishism • 16. Collecting & Selecting • 17. Industry & Heavy Metal • 18. Shaping a Changing World

Promotional Information

Leading sculptor Antony Gormley, informed and energised by a lifetime of making, and art critic and historian Martin Gayford, explore the central role of sculpture in the development of human culture from prehistory to the present day

About the Author

Sir Antony Gormley is a distinguished British artist and sculptor perhaps best known for his huge Angel of the North in Gateshead. He won the Turner Prize in 1994 and has been a Royal Academician since 2003. Gormley is one of the most critically respected artists working internationally, with works that have universal resonance. Martin Gayford is art critic for The Spectator and the author of acclaimed books on Van Gogh, Constable and Michelangelo. He is the author of Man with a Blue Scarf, Rendez-vous with Art and A Bigger Message. He has collaborated with David Hockney on A Bigger Message: Conversations with David Hockney and A History of Pictures, and has co-written a volume of travels and conversations with Philippe de Montebello: Rendez-vous with Art.

Reviews

'Very informative' - V&A Magazine

'The sculptor and the art critic have redefined the [art] form ' - Sunday Times

'The quality of production does full justice to the superb content …there’s a strong sense of a continuous narrative driven by shared enthusiasm and common, though not always parallel, ground' - artbookreview.com

'I lost myself in your book – it seemed to be about my world' - Carlo Rovelli, physicist and author of 'There Are Places in the World Where Rules Are Less Important'

'If you want to rethink your ideas about sculpture, this fascinating book will give you pause for thought on just about every page ... a mighty, lusciously produced tome ... You can lose yourself in just looking at the illustrations' - Financial Times

'A fully illustrated journey across time and space … a volume about relishing not just the range and variety, but also the power and possibilities of the discipline it discusses' - The Times

'Wide-ranging' - Art Mag

'Lavishly illustrated … invites us to take a new look at three-dimensional art as it ranges across eras, continents, scales and materials … an interesting and often revelatory book' - Rachel Campbell-Johnston, The Times

'[A] revealing examination of sculpture across the aeons' - Best Art Books of 2020, Sunday Times

'Imagine eavesdropping on two brilliant men discussing art, bouncing ideas around and clarifying each other’s thoughts … a fascinating conversation, which defines sculpture as widely as possible … Brilliant' - Daily Mail

'A fresh way to encounter art as a global phenomenon' - Literary Review

'There is something very personal about Gormley and Gayford’s conversations ... The maker brings renewed understanding to the writer, the critic, the reader, the viewer. This understanding enables us to better interrogate sculpture, and perhaps to reflect more fully on our lives in the world' - Studio International

'Gormley provides an exceptionally erudite foil for their joint insights into the merging of art, architecture, faith and life' - World of Interiors

'Lively conversations and explorations which encourage the reader to look at sculpture in a completely different way. ...The content, familiar and unfamiliar, is awesome. Gormley and Gayford are very accessible' - Mature Times