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Beast (Old Leather Head), 1958 Iron and composition 52.1 x 19.1 x 18.1 cm (20 ½ x 7 ½ x 7 ⅛ in) Unique Provenance The Artist Galerie Schmela, Düsseldorf Private collection (acquired from the above) Osborne Samuel, London Literature Dennis Farr and Eva Chadwick, Lynn Chadwick: Sculptor, With a Complete Illustrated Catalogue 1947- 2003, Lund Humphries, Farnham, 2014, cat. no. 275, p. 167, (ill. b&w) LY N N C H A D W I C K ( 1 9 1 4 - 2 0 0 3 ) The first part of the title, Beast, surfaced in Chadwick's work early on. The initial reference can be found in a key sculpture, Small Beast (National Gallery of Modern and Contemporary Art, Rome), made from iron and glass, dating from 1953. Another from the same year, Idiomorphic Beast (Bristol City Museum and Art Gallery) incorporates a split head as can be seen in Beast (Old Leather Head). Regarding Bristol Museum's Beast, Michael Bird remarks: 'For this piece, Chadwick explained to Bowness, he "went back to an earlier animal-like iron construction, stripped the crystals from its back and made it sit up on its hind legs". While the "Beast" in the title acknowledged a new determination "to produce work which expresses vitality directly rather than by illusion" - the beginning of a long series of "Beasts"...' (Michael Bird, Lynn Chadwick, Lund Humphries, Farnham, 2014, p. 66). The antenna-like extensions so apparent at the top of Beast (Old Leather Head) can be traced back to Idiomorphic Beast, and even further to Chadwick's transition from mobiles to stabiles. Michael Bird states Chadwick's tendency during this formative time was to convey a 'lightning-conductor wiriness in which a sculpture was a kind of receiving and transmitting apparatus, earthed to the ground (an idea to which Chadwick would repeatedly return).' (Ibid.) The complex network of tendril-like appendages is a motif which Chadwick explored on several of his significant sculptures and which clearly appealed to him. One of the finest examples can be seen on his 1954 iron and composition, Untitled (University of Michigan Museum of Art, Michigan, USA), a rearing beast-like creature on three narrow, angled legs similar to Beast (Old Leather Head). 8