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Creative ❤: Vicken Parsons and Antony Gormley

Artsy Editorial
May 15, 2013 9:40PM

When Vicken Parsons and Antony Gormley met at London’s Slade School of Fine Art in 1979, neither could have imagined the course that their careers—or their partnership—would take. “In our early life, we did everything in the same room,” Gormley has said. “We would be soaking the brown rice and drawing and painting and sculpting and rocking the baby all in the same space.” Gormley went on to win the 1994 Turner Prize for his mind-melting public sculptures of deconstructed, cubistic human forms, while Parsons would build her reputation on intimate, semi-abstract paintings of landscapes and architectural spaces.

Although their practices could hardly differ more, in 2012 the pair came together to create the mobile sculptureRelational Aesthetics—a commission for a “Sweethearts” exhibition that showcased collaborations between artist couples. “I want to do my work. He wants to do his work,” Parsons has said in hindsight, however. “I don’t think we will work together again.”
Artsy Editorial