The Industry of Sculpture: Understanding Process and Practice

A collection of interview snapshots examining some of the processes and practices that make up the ‘industry of sculpture’. These aim to disseminate the first-hand knowledge of our interviewees and reveal and contextualise what they do. Their stories reinforce the fact that experts aren’t born, they’re made. Most people work hard at acquiring their knowledge and skills, enabling them to carve out their unique position and roll with the punches.

The complexity of the industry of sculpture as it hums, whirling along, with its multiple economies and ecologies, isn’t easy to understand or operate within. From artists to curators, fabricators, technicians and assistants; from engineers and architects to town planners; from stone masons to tree surgeons to haulage teams and art transporters; studio providers, crate makers, conservationists and archivists: this web of interdependencies is pulled in many directions. It services economic regeneration and social cohesion, art for art’s sake and art for investment. It’s these networks of experts, interns and others, with their breadth of skills, experience and labour, that make the wheels of the sculpture industry go ‘round.