Ben Pearce
Certainty, 2016
Corten steel
3100 x 1000 x 2300mm
Price on request
Certainty is a sculpture of weight, form and poise, balance and contradiction. Sculptor Ben Pearce has constructed a work that stands silent and tall within its environment, an intricate stacking of pieces of industrial corten steel - as if they were boulders found at the base of a cliff. How Pearce seems to coalesce an abrasive steel structure with the surrounding rhythms of native forest is the feat of a perceptive and skilful artist.
The rich, rusted patina of the steel works in tandem with the assemblage of rock-like formations to create a work that seems to mimic geological formations we see in our everyday surroundings. One can look at Certainty as a work that demands to be experienced over time; a balanced, solid entity that is certain in its presence. The material will endure - it may rust on the surface, but the structure will remain sound - part of the work’s angular, composed beauty.
The essence of each of Pearce’s sculptures is revealed in the medium used, be it the found objects - manifestations of memory made physical through reimagined childhood toys - reclaimed wood, bronze, or corten steel. Certainty holds an intriguing place in Pearce’s oeuvre as it explores scale and space in a novel manner for the artist; his largest work to date. Wherein his To Remember a Tree, Pearce’s 2016 exhibition at the Whakatāne exhibition centre, depicted life-sized bronze walnuts on an intimate scale - almost as if one could pick the work up and cradle it in the hand - Certainty explores geometries of mass, weightlessness, and physicality
More from this artist
Artist Bio
Pearce’s art explores memory and reconciles it with a recent and common ‘ancestor’ to us all: childhood.
He strives to make visible the quirks and tragedies of our mind’s recording machinations, to materialize the emotional states that can cripple our bodies, and which often distortthe way we record time and memory.
The nature of this internal landscape is of interest to Pearce; his sculptures may exist within his internal world, but they also seek to co-exist as time-travelers in our own.
His recent work employs found objects that are reshaped into forms suggestive of scientific apparatus or adjunct experiments. Works shift from one material to another, changing form and shape — shifting as if in a slow state of transmutation.
The assemblage work of Pearce regularly features rock like formations, which often mimic everydayobjects such as furniture or geological structures.
He is a New Zealand based sculptor who works with wood, stone, metal and found objects.
Pearce completed a Bachelor of Fine Arts in 2003, majoring in sculpture at Whanganui Quay School of Fine Arts and has exhibited regularly in New Zealand and Australia since.
His work has featured in shows discussing sculpture in New Zealand at City Art Gallery, Sergeant Gallery, Suter Gallery and Whakatāne Gallery. He has work held in the public and private collections.
His work ‘Great Grandfather Clock’ won the 2009 Waikato youth award, his work Mergar won the Moly Morpeth Canaday Award in 2014, and in 2016 Stone Age Eight Gauge won the Number 8 Wire Award.
He was selected by Warwick Brown for his collectors guide ‘Seen this Century’, which features 100 contemporary New Zealand artists.
