on form 14 at Asthall Manor

The seventh biennial on form outdoor sculpture exhibition is being held at Asthall Manor in Oxfordshire (I posted here about their 2012 show). Like its predecessors it is a display of sculpture in stone. 204 works of high quality from 30 sculptors are on show, mostly in the grounds but some in the ballroom and others in St Nicholas church near the house.

The on form 14 website is so comprehensive that there is little need for much description here, but the following (in no particular order) interested me. Matthew Spener’s Campionessa (various marble pieces, left) and Jude Tucker’s Blue Helicore (Ancaster weatherbed, right):

John Joekes’ Stela (Slate, gold leaf and paint) (caesura, pause, Latin):

William Peers’ Darzle was in Horton stone (much used by Henry Moore) but looked like metal:

Matthew Simmonds’ troglodytic Rotunda II (Travatine, left) was an unusual idea, as was Alasdair Thomson’s Naomi (Carrara marble, one of four like pieces, right) – (though I worry about the loading on that coathook):

I would like to have taken home David Klein’s War Horse II (Bath stone, left) and Paul Vanstone’s Rainforest Giants (Indian rainforest marble, right):

The ‘male gaze’ was well catered for, mostly by the female hand (this is a selling exhibition), left to right, Aly Brown’s Hathor (Vietnam marble), David Klein’s Line II (Bath stone), Aly Brown’s Parvati (Portland stone), and Selene (Purbeck marble):

while Mel Fraser took a more robust view of the female form in Destiny (Persian travertine, right) and Venus (Zimbabwean springstone, left):

on form 14 continues to 6 July and isnwell worth visiting - the garden is looking particularly fine this year. Asthall Manor may offer additional interest for some in having been the home of the Mitford sisters from 1919-26. Katherine Frelon (Shop.Cook.Eat) is in charge of the pop-up café, The Potting Shed – highly recommended.

And in the skies over Oxfordshire:

Ceci n'est pas une sculpture

(A USAF B2 deployed to RAF Fairford)