Looking through ART

Cornwall-based artists Thomas-Irvine are the latest to be invited to create work at Tremenheere Gardens

- Thomas-Irvine

Ask any art-lover who has been to Cornwall and the name Tremenheere is sure to bring a gleam to the eye. This stunning sculpture garden near Penzance seamlessly combines the work of internationally renowned artists, Turner Prize winners, and Royal Academicians with large-scale exotic and subtropical planting, woods, stream, and rolling lawns. There is an ever-evolving program of contemporary artwork created by artists who have interacted with the setting to create site-specific permanent work that harmonizes with the landscape. It is where art and garden meet; symbiotic spiritualism.

It’s not surprising that you will find work by internationally acclaimed artist Richard Long in residence, as well work by Royal Academicians David Nash and Tim Shaw. New for 2020 is a piece by Cornwall-based artists Amy and Oliver Thomas-Irvine whose work spans across sculpture, architecture, installation, performance, drawing, and print. Their commission Holding Breath is a large-scale sculptural work, fusing architectural supporting structures with geological formations. And perhaps most important of all for visitors - and in common with many works in the gardens - it is entirely interactive. The sculpture will shield, tower over, and under the viewer depending on which way it is approached, revealing slices of the surrounding gardens, sky, horizon, and supporting beams; combining architectural simplicity with a sense of nervous energy and tension. The openings in the structure are designed to interact with both nature and viewer, allowing the visitors and the wind to pass through the work and the structure to breathe.