Penny Hardy

Penny Hardy

Sculptor

Newton Ferrers
Devon
United Kingdom

My current set of figures express organic forms as tensile elements and are inspired by the expressive and dynamic forms of contemporary dancers. They are made using a soft aluminium wire to create the fluid frame, which is then strengthened and enhanced using resin filler. By using these flexible, sinuous materials the dancers raw and exposed movement is conveyed. By leaving out a lot of mass within the sculpture and exposing wires outside of the main form a vision of movement is created - where the limb may have been or the extremes of a dancer’s movement contained within that pose. I have called these pieces ‘Torsion’ to describe the twisting action of the body as it moves through the dance.

I have completed a commission for an architects practice for their main entrance foyer. This sculpture was to portray an architectural theme and to represent an ‘inspirational, tall building’ using simple materials - wood and sheet metal. The final piece will be about 2m high, with a central core of rich cherry wood and mild steel fins. The style of this sculpture echoes the materials used in a previous commission for the Methodist Central Hall in Plymouth for a sculptural cross, displayed in their main foyer. The finished piece was very effective, with the edges of the wavy, metal fins, catching the light, creating a rippling river effect.

The sense of movement and dynamics within sculpture provides it with life and vitality and whilst remaining true to the use of simple, raw materials, my aim is to capture this. The two contrasting and concurrent methods I am using provide different challenges due to the nature of the materials and their own restrictions. I am increasing the scale of the dancers to enable the fluidity of the lines to flow with ease across the form, twisting around and out of the body, muscles and sinews creating a taught and stretched figure that also has softness and depth. By contrast I feel the hard lines of the wood and steel present their own way of conveying movement and I am exploring the use of layers, light reflection with hard or textured edges to create a sense of fluidity with these more inflexible materials.

I work on a commission basis whilst also producing pieces for exhibitions.