Lucy Skaer (born 1975) is a contemporary English artist who works with

sculpture Sculpture is the branch of the visual arts that operates in three dimensions. Sculpture is the three-dimensional art work which is physically presented in the dimensions of height, width and depth. It is one of the plastic arts. Durable sc ...

film A film also called a movie, motion picture, moving picture, picture, photoplay or (slang) flick is a work of visual art that simulates experiences and otherwise communicates ideas, stories, perceptions, feelings, beauty, or atmosphere ...

painting Painting is the practice of applying paint, pigment, color or other medium to a solid surface (called the "matrix" or "support"). The medium is commonly applied to the base with a brush, but other implements, such as knives, sponges, and ...

, and

drawing Drawing is a form of visual art in which an artist uses instruments to mark paper or other two-dimensional surface. Drawing instruments include graphite pencils, pen and ink, various kinds of paints, inked brushes, colored pencils, crayons, ...

. Her work has been exhibited internationally. Skaer is a member of the Henry VIII’s Wives artist collective, and has exhibited a number of works with the group. She currently lives and works in

Glasgow Glasgow ( ; sco, Glesca or ; gd, Glaschu ) is the most populous city in Scotland and the fourth-most populous city in the United Kingdom, as well as being the 27th largest city by population in Europe. In 2020, it had an estimated popul ...

and

London London is the capital and largest city of England and the United Kingdom, with a population of just under 9 million. It stands on the River Thames in south-east England at the head of a estuary down to the North Sea, and has been a majo ...

Early life and education

Skaer was born in

Cambridge Cambridge ( ) is a university city and the county town in Cambridgeshire, England. It is located on the River Cam approximately north of London. As of the 2021 United Kingdom census, the population of Cambridge was 145,700. Cambridge bec ...

. She studied Fine Art at

Glasgow School of Art The Glasgow School of Art (GSA; gd, Sgoil-ealain Ghlaschu) is a higher education art school based in Glasgow, Scotland, offering undergraduate degrees, post-graduate awards (both taught and research-led), and PhDs in architecture, fine art, and ...

Work

Lucy Skaer's works often depicts relationships between abstraction and the direct material nature of objects. Many of her works are replicas of historical objects which are translated and re-contextualized in new mediums. Skaer's work has had a particularly strong engagement with images and historical objects depicting archaeology, ecology, the English landscape,

British Empire The British Empire was composed of the dominions, colonies, protectorates, mandates, and other territories ruled or administered by the United Kingdom and its predecessor states. It began with the overseas possessions and trading posts esta ...

, and

Neolithic architecture The Neolithic period, or New Stone Age, is an Old World archaeological period and the final division of the Stone Age. It saw the Neolithic Revolution, a wide-ranging set of developments that appear to have arisen independently in several parts ...

as her 2008 installation, ''The Siege''. Much of Skaer's work also consists of objects which interact with and change public spaces. In one piece, she took up a paving stone on

's Buchanan Street and then had the

Earl Earl () is a rank of the nobility in the United Kingdom. The title originates in the Old English word ''eorl'', meaning "a man of noble birth or rank". The word is cognate with the Scandinavian form ''jarl'', and meant "chieftain", particular ...

of Glasgow ceremoniously lay down a replacement, while in an

Amsterdam Amsterdam ( , , , lit. ''The Dam on the River Amstel'') is the Capital of the Netherlands, capital and Municipalities of the Netherlands, most populous city of the Netherlands, with The Hague being the seat of government. It has a population ...

-based piece, she left a

diamond Diamond is a Allotropes of carbon, solid form of the element carbon with its atoms arranged in a crystal structure called diamond cubic. Another solid form of carbon known as graphite is the Chemical stability, chemically stable form of car ...

and a

scorpion Scorpions are predatory arachnids of the order Scorpiones. They have eight legs, and are easily recognized by a pair of grasping pincers and a narrow, segmented tail, often carried in a characteristic forward curve over the back and always end ...

side-by-side on a pavement. She has also secretly hidden

moth Moths are a paraphyletic group of insects that includes all members of the order Lepidoptera that are not butterflies, with moths making up the vast majority of the order. There are thought to be approximately 160,000 species of moth, many of w ...

and

butterfly Butterflies are insects in the macrolepidopteran clade Rhopalocera from the Order (biology), order Lepidoptera, which also includes moths. Adult butterflies have large, often brightly coloured wings, and conspicuous, fluttering flight. The ...

pupa A pupa ( la, pupa, "doll"; plural: ''pupae'') is the life stage of some insects undergoing transformation between immature and mature stages. Insects that go through a pupal stage are holometabolous: they go through four distinct stages in their ...

e in criminal courts in the hope that they will hatch in mid-trial. Sperm whale skull front view (Lucy Skaer)

In 2003, Skaer was shortlisted for the

Beck's Futures Beck's Futures was a British art prize founded by London's Institute of Contemporary Arts and sponsored by Beck's beer given to contemporary artists. Prior to the establishment of the prize in 2000, Beck's had sponsored several exhibitions of con ...

prize. In 2008, Skaer was the subject of a retrospective of her works since 2001 at the

Fruitmarket Gallery The Fruitmarket Gallery is a contemporary art gallery in Edinburgh, Scotland. Since its opening in 1974, the gallery has become part of the Scottish contemporary art scene. After a period of closure to undergo a significant renovation, the ga ...

in Edinburgh, Scotland which included newly commissioned work, and a comprehensive monograph book was published to accompany the show. In April 2009, Skaer was shortlisted for the prestigious

Turner Prize The Turner Prize, named after the English painter J. M. W. Turner, is an annual prize presented to a British visual artist. Between 1991 and 2016, only artists under the age of 50 were eligible (this restriction was removed for the 2017 award) ...

for the sculptures ''Black Alphabet'', (26 slender sculptures made of coal dust in the shape of

Constantin Brâncuși Constantin Brâncuși (; February 19, 1876 – March 16, 1957) was a Romanian Sculpture, sculptor, painter and photographer who made his career in France. Considered one of the most influential sculptors of the 20th-century and a pioneer of ...

's ''Bird in Space''), and ''Leviathan Edge'', an installation which included the skull of a sperm whale, drawings, and sculptures. (She lost out to Glasgow-based artist Richard Wright). Skaer has made a number of

16mm film 16 mm film is a historically popular and economical gauge of film. 16 mm refers to the width of the film (about inch); other common film gauges include 8 and 35 mm. It is generally used for non-theatrical (e.g., industrial, educ ...

s with the British artist

Rosalind Nashashibi Layla Rosalind Nashashibi (born 1973) is a Palestinian-English artist based in London. Nashashibi works mainly with 16 mm film but also makes paintings and prints. Her work often deals with everyday observations merged with mythological elemen ...

including ''Flash in the Metropolitan'' in 2006, which depicts the artifacts and artworks of the Metropolitan Museum of Art in New York as they appeared in a dimmed light of the museum interrupted by the flashes of a strobe. The two have collaborated on the films ''Our Magnolia'' and ''Pygmalion Event,'' as well as several others.

Exhibitions

* 52nd

Venice Biennale The Venice Biennale (; it, La Biennale di Venezia) is an international cultural exhibition hosted annually in Venice, Italy by the Biennale Foundation. The biennale has been organised every year since 1895, which makes it the oldest of ...

, Scottish Show, 2007 *

, Edinburgh, 2008 *

Exhibition, Finalist, 2009 * "A Boat Used As A Vessel",

Kunsthalle Basel Kunsthalle Basel is a contemporary art gallery in Basel, Switzerland. As Switzerland's oldest and still most active institution for contemporary art, Kunsthalle Basel forms a vital part of Basel's cultural centre and is located next to the city's ...

, Basel, Switzerland, April 2009 – June 2009. * "Rachael, Peter, Caitlin, John." Location One, New York, 2010. * Rosalind Nashashibi/ Skaer, (collaborative films)

Murray Guy Murray Guy was a contemporary art gallery specializing in emerging and mid-career contemporary artists. Founded by Margaret Murray and Janice Guy in 1998, the gallery was located in the Chelsea, Manhattan gallery district at 453 West 17th Street. ...

, 2010 * "Reanimation. Nashashibi/Skaer."

Carnegie Museum of Art The Carnegie Museum of Art, is an art museum in the Oakland neighborhood of Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania. Originally known as the Department of Fine Arts, Carnegie Institute and was at what is now the Main Branch of the Carnegie Library of Pittsbur ...

, Pittsburgh, PA, 2010. * The Centre Pompidou, 2010. * "Film for an Abandoned Projector."

Leeds Leeds () is a city and the administrative centre of the City of Leeds district in West Yorkshire, England. It is built around the River Aire and is in the eastern foothills of the Pennines. It is also the third-largest settlement (by populati ...

, UK, 2011. "Lucy Skaer: Film for an Abandoned Projector."
Artforum. 2011. * "Harlequin is as Harlequin Does."

, New York, 2012. * "Scene, Hold, Ballast,"

SculptureCenter SculptureCenter is a not-for-profit, contemporary art museum located in Long Island City, Queens, New York City. It was founded in 1928 as "The Clay Club" by Dorothea Denslow. In 2013, SculptureCentre attracted around 13,000 visitors. History Fou ...

, New York, 2012. * "Flash in the Metropolitan",

Metropolitan Museum of Art The Metropolitan Museum of Art of New York City, colloquially "the Met", is the largest art museum in the Americas. Its permanent collection contains over two million works, divided among 17 curatorial departments. The main building at 1000 ...

, New York, 2012. * "Lucy Skaer,"

Mount Stuart House Mount Stuart House, on the east coast of the Isle of Bute, Scotland, is a country house built in the Gothic Revival style and the ancestral home of the Marquesses of Bute. It was designed by Sir Robert Rowand Anderson for the 3rd Marquess in ...

, Scotland, June–Oct 2013. * "Lucy Skaer," Yale Union, Portland, OR, July–September 2013. * "Lucy Skaer, Available Fonts", KW, Berlin, October 2017 – January 2018. *"Lucy Skaer: The Green Man", Talbot Rice Gallery, Edinburgh, 26 July – 6 October 2018.

References

General references

* ''Vitamin D: New perspectives in drawing''. London: Phaidon. 2005. (pgs on Lucy Skaer)
Interview for "Rachael, Peter, Caitlin, John."
Location One, NY. 2010.

External links

Additional information on Lucy Skaer including artworks, articles, text panels and full biography
Interview
with Lucy Skaer fro
MAP Magazine
{{DEFAULTSORT:Skaer, Lucy 1975 births Living people 21st-century British women artists Alumni of the Glasgow School of Art Artists from Cambridge Scottish contemporary artists Scottish women artists