Contemporary Art New York

Michael Snape

Australian (1951)

Michael Snape graduated from the National Art School in Sydney. His sculptures are born from detailed drawings brought to life in form and volume through the process of laser-cutting and cold-pressing steel sheets. Snape builds spaces using multiple figure compositions that address the artist’s concerns with forming and shaping the raw material to exhaust its capacity. Whilst often using one drawing several times, each application creates a vastly unique sculpture. The bowl sculptures are cold-pressed into moulds, swelling the drawn figures and bringing them to life. The negative spaces enable the sculpture to be read through, rather than looked at, and is a key component to experiencing the work. “The space between the figures carries a related language and yields a different richness less encumbered by information”, explains the artist.

Snape has been the subject of 25 solo exhibitions exploring his comprehensive oeuvre and has executed 23 public and private sculpture commissions. He is represented in leading museum collections including the Art Gallery of New South Wales and The Powerhouse Museum, Sydney, Australia.