Rosie Musgrave carved her first
piece of stone in her early 20s. She was apprenticed variously
with sculptors and then studied figurative sculpture in
clay, wood and stone at Sir John Cass and City & Guilds
Art Schools in London.
With her young family she ran a smallholding in Cornwall
and on moving to Devon worked in complementary health.
Her practice as a somatic therapist together with an early
training as a physiotherapist and her employment at the
Social Care Unit in the crypt of St Martin-in-the-Fields,
Trafalgar Square, have informed her work.
The quality of form, the surface tension between form
and space, light and shadow and the sense of touch and
of relationship are all important to her.
In the last ten years she has returned to full-time
stone carving and lives and works on Dartmoor in Devon.
"Many of my earliest memories are of being amongst
mountains and rocks, of collecting stones in my pockets.
I have always been drawn to the beauty and presence
of this ancient material that has helped to shape
our landscape. Much of the limestone that I carve
was laid down in the Jurassic age, at least 140 million
years ago.
I cut stone mostly by hand with hammers, chisels,
rasps and abrasives, exploring ways to honour its
innate sense of gravity and stillness while still
expressing energy and movement within the carved form.
It is often only when a piece is nearly finished that
its sensuality is revealed: the stone unveils its
secrets with shell forms, veins of colour fossilised
within the substance of time.
I carve stone as an invitation to touch. I believe
that the relevance of touch-stones is increasingly
important in this visual age. Exploring their changing
temperatures, textures, forms and spaces not only
offers new landscapes of discovery but also a sense
of being an infinitesimally small part of a much greater
whole."
Rosie Musgrave’s work continues to be featured
in magazines and shown at galleries and exhibitions
and held in various private collections.
SELECTED RECENT EXHIBITIONS AND PROJECTS
2007-2008: ‘The Three Gunas’ Triptych: South Wing, Sharpham House, Ashprington, Devon: a submission for the ACE Award for Art in a Religious Context
2007: Delamore Gallery Winter Show
2007: Artmill Gallery, Plymouth, Devon
2007: The Brownston Gallery, Modbury, Devon
2007: Quartz Arts Festival, Queen’s College, Taunton, Somerset (group show)
2007: SouthWest Sculptors at the Dartington Gallery, Dartington Estate, Devon (group show)
2007: Devon Open Studios
2007: Millstream Sculpture Garden, Bishopstrow, Wiltshire (4 man show)
2007: Delamore House, Cornwood, Devon – Early Summer Exhibition (group show)
2006-2007: ‘Tsunami Noni’ on Tour: Cartmel Priory, Hexham Abbey, Exeter, Leicester, Lincoln and Canterbury Cathedrals
2007: Royal West of England Academy: Open Sculpture Exhibition (group show)
2006-2007: The Biscuit Factory, Newcastle upon Tyne
2006: SouthWest Sculptors – Exhibition with members of Sculpture Bretagne at the Ariel Centre, Totnes, Devon
2006: Beaford Arts – Art at the Red House, Exeter, Devon (4 man show)
2005: “Emergence”: Dartington Estate, Devon as part of ‘Arts in Process’, Dartington College of Arts (4 man show)
2005: As a member of SouthWest Sculptors, exhibition at Landivisiau, France at the invitation of Sculpture Bretagne
2005: BlindArt Inaugural Open Exhibition, ‘Sense and Sensuality’ at the Royal College of Art, London
2005: The Coombe Gallery, Fosse Street, Dartmouth, Devon
AWARDS
One of 20 Devon artists selected to promote Visual Arts and Rural Businesses in the region 2007
Devon Artsculture Funding 2007:
South West Academy Summer Open Exhibition Briane Bearne Memorial prize 2002
BIBLIOGRAPHY
'Floating this Boat of Stone': a Colloquy on the making of Tsunami Noni - Edited by Philip Kuhn, Itinerant Press 2008 (ISBN 978-1-906322-03-8)
BBC Radio Devon - 'The Review' with Jo Loosemore: Conversation between Two Sculptors 2008
'Tsunami Noni' Tour and Installation: BBC News. BBC Radio Devon. Church Times. Local Press articles
Mid Devon Advertiser: feature article 2006 (April)
Devon Life Magazine: feature article 2004 (March)
MEMBERSHIP OF GROUP/ PROFESSIONAL BODIES
Royal British Society of Sculptors
SouthWest Sculptors
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