Standing figure

Lynn Chadwick is regarded as one of Britain’s greatest 20th-century sculptors. In 1956 he gained international recognition when representing Britain at the 28th Venice Biennale, where he was awarded the international prize for sculpture. One of the ‘geometry of fear’ sculptors whose work helped define the anxieties of the post-war era, Chadwick is best known for his angular skeletal forms which evoke human figures and animals.

In 1969 Chadwick produced a series of sculptures titled ‘Elektra’, which means ‘shining one’ in Greek. This series featured single or groups of two or three female figures standing, seated or reclining. With this series, he introduced polished areas for the first time, ‘to get a bit of contrast and colour’. Wanting to give their almost abstract bodies curves, he said he decided to incorporate ‘something slightly realistic somewhere’ giving them breast plates with rounded tummies that he then polished.1 ‘Standing figure’ is a colour lithograph of a single standing ‘Elektra’ figure showing her polished face and torso.

1. Interview with Lynn Chadwick by Cathy Courtney, ‘National life stories: Artists’ lives’, 1995, sound recording transcript, British Library, pp 278 & 279, sounds.bl.uk/related-content/TRANSCRIPTS/021T-C0466X0028XX-ZZZZA0.pdf, accessed 29 Nov 2021