Mark Tanner Sculpture Award: Thinking is Making at Cross Lane Projects

Cross Lane Projects celebrates 20 years of the Mark Tanner Sculpture Award with an group exhibition of the Award winners from 2013 to the present year. Thinking Is Making gathers the work of 10 artists all of whom approach sculpture in innovative ways that illustrate the field’s ever-evolving nature.

The Mark Tanner Sculpture Award is the UK’s most significant sculpture prize, uncovering emerging artists whose work pushes the boundaries of sculpture, with a focus on the “commitment to process” and “sensitivity to material.”

Thinking Is Making showcases the work of the following artists who won the award most recently: Olivia Bax, Megan Broadmeadow, Rosie Edwards, Iain Hales, Lee Holden, Steph Huang, Dean Kenning, Kate Lyddon, Anna Reading and Frances Richardson. The exhibition focuses on how their work continued to develop after winning the award.

Let’s take a closer look at some of their work! 

Olivia Bax colourful paper pulp sculptures draw the eye and please the mind – the textured pieces often resemble machines, with wheels, mysterious handles and the sizes ranging from no bigger than a piece of fruit to large-scale works that fill swathes of the gallery. She covers the armature of her pieces in paper pulp that is imbued with colour rather than painted on top – the material already carries the hue.

Anna Reading’s conceptual interests lean towards environmental concerns and the creative ways in which living organisms adapt to challenges. Her sculptures combine organic materials like rocks and shells with wire, thread and steel. The resulting objects are intriguing fusions of the manmade and elements chosen from the natural world, all orchestrated by the artist’s hand. 

Rosie Edwards’ soft yet sturdy forms are almost asking to be touched: their satisfying grid structures are paired with creamy pastel colours and texture that at first glance appears squishy. Edwards is interested in the materials’ own voice and the way each piece develops as the material is handled, moulded and remoulded over time, carrying traces of each iteration.

Make sure you visit Kendal this summer as Thinking Is Making is the perfect survey of contemporary sculpture. Like all other artistic mediums sculpture is constantly in flux, yet the show gathers just the right amount of artists to display a cross-section of its current place and the way it’s been shifting over the last decade.