Encounter VIII

Lynn Chadwick made more than 20 “Encounters,” in which he transformed the human figure into one animal creature encountering another. He built the images around the tension created by such an encounter. The artist was primarily concerned with the emotional expressiveness of his work.

The imagery of triangles and lozenges is striking. References to African and Polynesian art often surface in Chadwick’s work.

In our relationships with others, we can live our humanity to the fullest. We dream, think, and live together with family, friends, and loved ones. The encounter with another is often a fraught moment in which different feelings surface simultaneously. For Chadwick, the artwork arose from precisely that kind of tension.

British sculptor Lynn Chadwick welded iron and bronze into expressionistic, angular figures. He started with mobiles after WWII, and in 1953 he created his first immobile sculptures. Chadwick dealt with three main themes: animals, encounters, and onlookers. Although his sculptures are essentially figurative, they often balance on the edge of abstraction.