WORK OF THE WEEK: Gary Hume, Sculpture 4, 2009

Gary Hume
Sculpture 4
2009
Sculpture: Marble with gloss paint, metal
Plinth: Painted bronze
Sculpture:96.5 x 54.9 x 24 cm / 37 ⅝ x 24 x 14 ⅛ in.
Plinth: 11.2 x 29.5 x 29.5 cm / 4 ⅜ x 11 ⅝ x 11 ⅝ in.

Sculpture 4 alludes to a fragment of Greek and Roman sculpture yet here Hume plays with the conventions of monumental marble sculpture with his hallmark bright, glossy paint charging the sculpture with emotion and a sense of latent movement. The limbs, though disembodied, maintain a sleek and sensual quality and encourage the viewer to walk around the sculpture, viewing it in the round.

Gary Hume was one of the young, Goldsmith artists included in Damien Hirst’s legendary Freeze exhibition in 1988, a group later referred to as the Young British Artists. The exhibition was set amidst the backdrop of Thatcherite Britain in a disused dockyard which had become synonymous with the economic and civil unrest of the time.

Gary Hume (b. 1962) represented Britain at the Venice Biennale in 1999 and the São Paulo Bienal in 1996, the same year he was nominated for the Turner Prize. His work was the subject of a one-person exhibition at Whitechapel Art Gallery in London in 1999, and in 2001 he was elected to the Royal Academy.

Since then he has had one-person exhibitions at institutions across Europe, including the Kestnergesellschaft in Hanover, Tate Britain in London, Kunsthaus Bregenz in Austria, the Irish Museum of Modern Art in Dublin, Modern Art Oxford, and Museum Dhondt-Dhaenens in Deurle, Belgium. Hume lives and works in London and Accord, New York.

In June 2026, Gary Hume released his latest monograph. An exploration by Martin Gayford into the artist's career and work, published by Lund Humphries.