Wave

2024
Horse Chestnut Burr (bleached)
32 x 42 x 42 cm | 12.6 x 16.5 x 16 in.

Eleanor Lakelin’s work is exhibited internationally and is part of private and public collections, including the Museum of Arts and Design, New York; Victoria & Albert Museum, UK; the Museum of London, UK; the Mint Museum of Craft and Design, USA; the National Museum in Oslo and most recently the Museum of Decorative Arts, Norway, 2024. In 2020, she received a major commission from Reading Museum, supported by the CAS Rapid Response Fund and in partnership with Frieze London, to create a piece which memorialises Reading Gaol’s most famous inmate, Oscar Wilde. Selected as part of a group of British sculptors and artists, Eleanor is developing a new work for The Extinction Collection. The artist is the recipient of notable awards and commendations, including a QEST Scholarship in 2018; winner of the Bespoke Category of the British Wood Awards in 2017; nomination for the Perrier-Jouët Arts Salon Prize in 2014; and The Cockpit Arts / Worshipful Company of Turners Award in 2011. Eleanor has been selected as a finalist for the Loewe Foundation Craft Prize 2022. The artist recently had her acclaimed second solo exhibition with the Gallery ‘Intimations’ in the summer of 2024.

A connection to the past is profound in Eleanor Lakelin’s work; she is fascinated by wood as a living, breathing substance with its own history of growth and struggle, centuries beyond our own. Her sculptural objects made in Horse Chestnut are created using a traditional woodworking lathe and centuries-old chisels and gouges, alongside modern tools and carving techniques. Her vessels appear like archaeological objects pulled from the ground; classical forms are referenced and smooth surfaces, reminiscent of ossified matter, rhythmically yield to knotted sections of burr.