Running from 21 April to 31 October, 2024 at Houghton Hall and Gardens in Norfolk, UK is “Time Horizon” by British artist Antony Gormley (born 1950). The large-scale exhibition, which spans the grounds and the house at the property, consists of 100 life-size cast iron sculptures of the human form, each weighing 620 kg and standing at an average of 191 cm.

Some works are buried, allowing only a part of the head to be visible, while others are buried to the chest or knees according to the topography.  Only occasionally do they stand on the existing surface. Around a quarter of the works are placed on concrete columns that vary from a few centimetres high to rising four metres off the ground.

The artist has said of the installation: “What is made here is a repositioning of the relationship of the body to the ground that asks big questions: what is a human being and what is the human being’s relationship to the planet.”

The impressive show invites a dialogue with the environment. The viewer is prompted to ask if humankind is ultimately above nature, conquering, manipulating it and in control of it…in harmony with it…or below it, helpless before its power, vastness and unpredictability. Or is there another truth? Does our place actually just fluctuate?

The artist adds: “My ambition for this show is that people should roam far and wide. Art has recently privileged the object rather than the experience that objects can initiate.  Time Horizon is not a picture, it is a field and you are in it.  The work puts the experience of the subject/visitor/protagonist on an equal footing with all material presences, organic and inorganic.  The quality of the light, the time of the year, the state of the weather and the condition of your mind, body and soul are all implicated in the field, as is all the evidence within it of human activity already accomplished as well as the plethora of life forms that surround the hall.”

Antony Gormley is one of the most important artists of his generation and is widely acclaimed for his sculptures, installations and public artworks that investigate the relationship of the human body to space.  His work has been exhibited throughout the UK and internationally. “Time Horizon” is organised by the Houghton Arts Foundation, with support from  Thaddaeus Ropac and White Cube galleries.

Links: Website (www.antonygormley.com)

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