On 12th March 2012 Westminster City Council will
unveil a new work by internationally renowned artist Naomi Press. Standing
at over three metres tall, Solo II’s installation in Cavendish Square
follows on from the success of Press’s acclaimed solo retrospective in
London at Bermondsey Project Space in October 2011.
The installation forms part of Westminster Council’s
City of Sculpture festival to promote public art in the capital. Launched in
2011, the project will transform the city into an open air gallery as part
of the build up to the 2012 London Olympic and Paralympic Games and Diamond
Jubilee.
Historically associated with the city’s cultural
elite, eminent figures who have lived or worked in Cavendish Square include
the sculptor, Robert William Siever, and Dame Ninette de Valois, one of the
founders of the Royal Ballet company. Press, who has exhibited
internationally in New York, Johannesburg and Cape Town, has herself been a
resident of Westminster since 2001.
Esteemed art historian and critic Edward Lucie-Smith,
who curated Naomi Press’s exhibition in London in October 2011, describes
the artist as “a major Modernist sculptor with close connections, personal
as well as artistic, to the fruitful alliance between British and American
sculpture fostered by Clement Greenberg.” Of her work he has commented: “A
particular point of interest in her sculpture is its gestural forms which
reflect Press’s early training as a dancer (something that would surely have
pleased Ninette de Valois)”.
Cavendish Square’s wide spectrum of artistic heritage
is particularly relevant to Press. As a young girl Press’s passion was for
ballet. She states that the “bending and soaring steel of Solo II recalls
the early excitement I experienced in dance”. Since living in Westminster,
Press’s work has increasingly reflected the influence of the city. Her works
in English heritage brick and terracotta, begun in 2000, show the influence
of London’s elaborate red-brick buildings; similarly her recent work in
silvered bronze is inspired by London as a centre of the world of fashion.
On the occasion of her recent London exhibition, curator and critic Robert
Metzger wrote: “Her dazzling rich work in the present exhibition seems to
have been shaped by the wind... Her tenacious determination to continuously
explore and expand her materials and technique is what sets her apart from
her peers.” Solo II demonstrates her ease working with diverse materials in
a variety of styles. In particular she praises stainless steel’s “hardness
and durability, alongside its reflective appearance, here brought to a high
mirror finish”.
The work is not only a celebration of Press’s artistic
journey but is also testament to the influential figures who have impacted
her career. During a lecture tour in the early 1980’s Press met Clement
Greenberg who became her close friend and mentor. Through Greenberg, Press
met other practitioners of her art such as Anthony Caro as well as the
painters Helen Frankenthaler and Kenneth Noland. “Clem encouraged my work in
steel,” Press says “and it was through his eyes that I was exposed to the
greatest sculptors of the 20th Century, David Smith and Anthony Caro.”
Cllr Robert Davis, Deputy Leader and Cabinet Member
for the Built Environment said: “Westminster City Council’s City of
Sculpture festival has been a fantastic success, bringing some of the most
exciting and imaginative pieces of art into the capital for the public to
engage with. I am delighted that this latest addition by Naomi Press will be
exhibited in Westminster’s Cavendish Square for all to enjoy.”