Simon Pope: Carved from Memory

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Spacex is pleased to present a new project by Simon Pope, which will be split over two sites at Spacex and Exeter Cathedral. Pope plans to restore a stone figure from Exeter Cathedral which his great grandfather crafted over 90 years ago and has great significance for five generations of his family. Rather than use the Cathedral's extensive archive for reference, the figure will be carved from the memory of the artist's grandmother working in dialogue with a local stonemason.

The installation at Spacex will comprise an audio recording between Pope's grandmother and the stonemason including the conversations and process of interpretation, imagining and reconstruction. The second stage of the project will be the display of the maquette created by the stonemason at Exeter Cathedral. As with some of Pope's previous work, this project brings together artists from traditional bases, craft-based in character into proximity with contemporary practice ' opening one approach to another and vice versa. The completed carved figure will be displayed in the Cathedral towards the end of 2009.