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'Tilde'
Metal, slate and found wood
'Stone King'
Serendipitous result of dropping a rock
'Untitled'
In order to find the perfect proportion, mathematicians of Antiquity invented The Golden Ratio, a complex arithmetic calculation whose solution received divine interpretations from the Renaissance onwards. While biologists have found this 'magic' number in countless elements of nature such as plants, minerals and the human form, many artists, authors, architects and musicians have since borrowed its configuration in order to achieve a higher sense of harmony within their work. Thankfully there are other more intuitive and less arithmetical ways to create equilibrium in a work of art, it can be argued that the quest for the perfect composition is a first and foremost a metaphor for finding a certain balance within oneself.
Elizabeth Cooke's work exemplifies this search for harmony. The title of her sculptures often refers to various types of dances (Cooke actually trained as a professional dancer before turning to stone carving and metalwork). For the artist, both practices are different forms of a similar pursuit - to find an internal equilibrium. She combines natural and industrial materials such as metal, stone and wood to create sculptures, within which materials operate as different forces interacting with each other. The outcome resists forming geometric and repetitive patterns, rejecting some kind of symbolic, interpretative and specific meaning in order to remain purely contemplative.
Her minimalist compositions are deceptively simple and are more a manifestation of materials as such than the self-expression of the artist. Her sculptures are meditative and reflect on the contemplation of nature as well as an understanding of its order, following the core principles of Zen philosophy. Like small monuments, they exude the wonderful calmness of always having existed.
Elizabeth Cooke was born in Ipswich. She studied Dance (BA and masters) at the Laban Centre for Movement and Dance in London during the 1980's. She then went on to work in Multimedia as a producer and project manager. During this time, in the 1990's, she 'discovered' sculpture and has worked as a sculptor since 1996. In 1997 she moved back to Suffolk.
To see more of her work registered on Saatchi Online click here, and visit the artist's own website, elizabethcooke.co.uk.
Victoria Chaine Mendrzyk
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Victoria Chaine Mendrzyk graduated with an MA Curating Contemporary Art from the Royal College of Art, a BA in Fine Art and History of Art from Goldsmiths College, University of London and a BA in Philosophy from University of Paris X, Nanterre. She has worked for Beaux-Arts Magazine, the Grand-Palais and at the Maison Rouge in Paris, at Sundaram Tagore Gallery in New-York, at Documenta 12 in Kassel and at Deichtorhallen in Hamburg. She is also an international correspondent for Art India Magazine. |
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| Published on 29-06-2009 |
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