Richard Hudson, Born 1954, UK

Love Me, 2016
Big Moma, 2003

'Love Me' is a giant sculpture of a heart in polished mirrored steel. In its center is a deep cavity, as if the form was hit hard by a powerful force, with a corresponding mound on the other side. This creates endless additional contours to the shape of the heart. Poised almost impossibly on its end, this giant heart seems to preside over the vineyards from its highest point, reflecting the earth and sky surrounding it.

"In my monumental sculpture of 'Love Me,' I have taken this emblematic symbol and metamorphosed it to represent the creation of the Universe through a black hole, together with the creation of life at the moment of conception," the artist explains. "I ask the viewer to 'reflect' with the polished mirrored steel surface on the wonderment of this world and nature's beauty all around."

Hudson’s 'Big Moma' is a cast bronze fountain in the shape of four breasts in circular formation from which water spouts.

“I was asked to create a fountain in a town square in Spain, with an emphasis on the importance of conserving water. While considering ideas around this, I recalled the wonderful Tintoretto painting at the National Gallery, 'The Origins of the Milky Way', where the goddess Hera’s spurting milk creates the stars of the Milky Way. I wondered how such an image would be received in the context of a public work of art. It was then that I decided to make a circular ring of breasts spouting pure water. I was also thinking about the purity of a mother's milk, nurturing the new born, hence life,” explains Hudson. The water flows through the "contours of the mother's breast, continuously purified, thence sustaining life."

The work was rejected as being too provocative for a Spanish piazza. However, the first one of the edition of three was bought by the Esbaluard Museum of Modern Art, Mallorca, Spain.

Biography

Richard Hudson was born in Gloucestershire, England. His creations, which range from the tiny to the monumental, are sensual, organic forms inspired by great 20th-Century sculptors, such as Jean Arp, Constantin Brancusi and Henry Moore. His recent work, ‘Tear’ in polished mirrored steel, has just been placed outside Madison Square Gardens in New York. Two new monumental works have recently been commissioned and will shortly be installed in London. He works in wood, marble, steel and bronze and his works can be found in many prominent private collections, foundations and museums around the world, and regularly exhibits in stately settings, such as the Chatsworth Estate in England.

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Richard Hudson discussing his work