Sarah Myerscough Gallery

Marlène Huissoud has created a striking new cabinet made from thousands of naturally spent silkworm cocoons which are varnished with a thin layer of a dark natural honey bee bio resin. The daughter of a beekeeper, Marlène developed this material after extensive research and cross-industry collaboration. She comments that, ‘I integrate insects with my work to help us to be more aware of other species: we are not alone on the planet and it looks like we’ve forgotten this. Insects are crucial and so important to us. I want to celebrate the beauty of the insect world.’ Alongside these arthropodic collaborations, the gallery will present new sculptural art and design pieces in natural materials that herald an authentic vision of hope for the future of design and material culture, in which we live in greater respect to and knowledge of our environments. Many of the artists directly collaborate with nature to produce their pieces. The design duo Full Grown have cultivated their orchard of grown Willow chairs over nearly 20 years. Best described as botanical craftsmen, they employ ancient techniques to grow their tree-chairs, manipulating a bough’s directions of growth through custom frames and grafting together new furniture forms in the live tree. In doing so, they re-imagine the manufacturing process of the modern production of furniture. Full Grown won best contemporary object at Design Miami/ Paris in 2023 and SFMOMA, USA, acquired thier work in 2024. In another re-considering of the design process, Gareth Neal works with mahogany veneers, a material byproduct of musical instruments. His Khaya Chest of Draws, is the newest addition to this series, celebrating the imperfection and irregularities of industrial waste towards a vivid and unique furniture piece.  

Continuing with wood as a material laden with the capacity for meaning and experimentation, Nic Webb studies the specific characteristics of each piece of timber he sources and allows this to inform the direction of his sculpture, in a process Nic calls ‘co-design’. Eleanor Lakelin also celebrates wood as a living, breathing substance with its own history of growth and struggle, centuries beyond our own. Her second major solo show, held at the gallery in the summer of 2024, encompassed her most significantly scaled works to date and in Horse Chestnut burr, revealing the anarchic natural chaos found beneath the surface when a tree reacts to an external affliction. This anatomical expression by the tree also represents a glorious act of self-healing and engages us in the complexities and resilience of nature, while also visualising its fragility in the face of human consumption. Lakelin’s work is exhibitioned internationally including the Museum of Arts and Design, New York; Victoria & Albert Museum, UK and most recently the Museum of Decorative Arts, Norway in 2024.

We bring seminal wooden vessels from Ernst Gamperl, the first winner of the Loewe Prize in 2017. The artist has revolutionised the practice of woodturning by developing entirely new modes of working that push the vessel to its technical limits. Similarly, innovative material science lies at the heart of Marc Fish’s practice, who was recently exhibited at Denver Art Museum for Biophilia, 2024. We are exhibiting Marc’s new Kasumi Uchi console table, made of laminated oak veneers and finished with a weathering effect and multiple layers of wood wax oil. The Kasumi Uchi metal finish, roughly translated to mean ‘cloud metal’ is based upon metalworking techniques traditionally used in Japan for jewellery and small objects. Alongside this, we present a new mirror design, laminated in oak veneers, combined with layers of woodwax oil. 

Also making in wood is New York based sculptor Christopher Kurtz, continuing his exploration of the waveform at PAD24. The new wavelet console and shelves are exemplary of how Kurtz sees sculpture and furniture as deeply intertwined. We encounter waves as movement in many forms: from oceanic waves to an immaterial sound wave or the physical gesture of the wave. The wavelet series captures these, transforming movement into powerful and subtle objects. Akin to Christopher’s exploration of rippling forms, Katrien Doms wields fire and scorching heat to sculpt softwoods into undulating wall hangings. In certain lights, these works become a deep gold, examples of wooden matter in a transient reaction to their environment. Japan based artist Mayumi Onagi has created quiet and poised sculptural forms using Urushi, a natural lacquer made from the sap of the Urushi tree. Using the “Kanshitsu” technique which involves layering soil and hemp on top of each other, taking many days to create the shape and finish of the surface. Kenji Honma, also works with Urushi lacquer balancing age-old Japanese techniques with contemporary self-taught methods. His works are comprised of the split and hollowed body of the Urushi tree, and the inside of these are treated with a traditional lacquer-work technique “nashiji-nuri”, in which the lacquer is combined with tin or stone powder to create a captivating mirror like effect.??

Working with softer materials, Teresa Hastings has created a monumental hand-dyed and woven tapestry, composed of five interweaving parts. The work is a three-dimensional textured expanse of wool and hammered iron which has been twisted, knotted, woven and fringed with plant fibres, all of which have been hand processed in her studio. Splitting her time between her studios in London and the Indian Himalayas, Teresa’s tapestry is borne out of an architectural approach to fibre and material. The artist aims to continue developing her work with minimal impact on the climate, acknowledging how her practice is bound by specific weather systems, mindful of the rising temperatures and increasing floods due to climate change. Teresa is a recipient of the scholarship for woven textiles from The Crafts Council and in 2015 won the Heritage Building and Environment Award at the NAS Design partnership awards in London. Alida Kuzemczak Sayer using repeatedly marked and torn layers of Japanese Mulberry paper, explores the sculptural possibilities of language and mark-making. In doing so, she channels the seemingly unruly and proliferating aspect of language into soft and rhythmic sculptures. 

Mami Kato, best known for her sculptural works in rice straw, uses the material to highlight the ability of raw materials to provide energy and sustain life. Her work Ume is richly tactile and highly concentrated in form, meticulously composed and quietly brimming with what Glenn Adamson has referred to as ‘constant flow’. Similarly, Luke Fuller’s practice brims with an earthly vitality. His ceramic furniture forms are born from throwing clay down onto wooden formers, reminiscent of action painting from the abstract impressionist movement. Each piece is built by piling handfuls of clay on top of one another through perfectly inelastic collisions. In 2023 the V&A acquired a major ceramic work of Luke’s titled Lode. Finally, we are exhibiting a collection of urns and mirrors from metal artist Adi Toch. Their surface is born from a unique process. After carefully shaping and finishing her metal objects in the studio she relinquishes control and surrenders them to the unpredictable forces of the subterranean elements, burying the objects in the earth for prolonged periods.