Bernard McGuigan was born in Britain in 1956 and has been stone-carving since the age of 16. Though the realities of earning a living have necessitated quite different jobs at various times, he has been carving full-time for most of his life. He is an associate of the Royal Society of British Sculptors and has exhibited at the Royal Academy. His work has been shown in many exhibitions over the years and features in a number of private and public collections both in this country and abroad.
He identifies and exploits the relative properties of hardness and softness, colour and texture, in a range of stones including French limestone, Welsh slate, Scottish sandstone and varieties of marble and alabaster. Responding to the nature of each and, working directly into the stone, he has developed his own distinctive approach to the representation of the human body and the female figure in particular.
The pieces are graceful and deceptively simple, in terms of both their carving style and of their tranquil potency. When first coming across an exhibition of his work, we delight in the perceived tension between stone as a reliable and in relation to our own lives, timeless material, and what we know of the yielding (and less reliable) contours of the human body. With time this sensation may be remembered in the mind like a line from a requiem, quietly insistent. In returning to his theme and its many variations, McGuigan does not set out to "challenge" us in the contemporary and confrontational sense of the word. There is no mention of "removing boundaries" in his mission statement. On the contrary, in a form of homage to the way that stones have long been used to mark boundaries and places of passage, his figures appear to define the limits of individual tenderness in a harsh and competitive world. Standing between artist and speactator, they mediate the ever-present challenge of being alive.
Awards 2005
The
British Design Association (Best Sculptor)
Art London Gold Award
Selected Exhibitions
2005
Lucy B. Campbell Fine Art
2005 Art London
2005 Mill Dene Gardens, Glos.
2005 Art Aid
2005 Royal College of Art, London
2004 Art London
2004 Lucy Campbell Fine Art
2004 Ronald Pile Gallery
2004 The Bohun Gallery
2004 Rachel Bebbb
2004 Hannah Perschar
2003
The New Ashgate Gallery
2003 Hannah Perschar Sculpure Garden, Surrey
2003 Langham Fine Art, Suffolk
2003 The Bruton Street Gallery, London
2003 Manchester Art House
2003 Ronald Pile Gallery, Ely
2003 Rachel Bebb, Garde Gallery, Hampshire
2002
Art Ireland, Dublin
2002 The Bruton Street Gallery, London
2002 Hannah Perschar
2002 Rachel Bebb, Garden Gallery, Hampshire
2002 Ronald Pile Gallery, Ely
2002 Burghley House
2002 Bow House
2001
The Bruton Street Gallery, London
2001 Art London
2001 The Bow House Gallery
2001 Guestingthorpe Garden of Art
2001 Burghley House, Cusp Gallery
2000
Hannah Perschar
2000 Rachel Bebb
2000 Art London
2000 Bruton Street Gallery
2000 Taylor Woodrow, H.Q.
1999
Hannah Perschar
1998 Manchester Art House
1997 Bruton Street Gallery
1996 Royal Academy
1995 Texaco, H.Q.
1995 Savoy Hotel
1993 The Barbican
Recent Publications
Modern
British Sculptors
The Sculptors Bible
Fuji Television: Documentry
Sculpting Basics Book
The Pursuit of Paradise
Selected Private, Public and Corporate Collections
Sir
Sydney and Lady Lipworth
Bank of India
Sir Christopher Ondartje
Forbes Foundation
Capitol and Provident
