Bridget Heriz

Bridget Heriz was born in 1949 in Germany, where her father taught at the British Army of the Rhine school at Plön. She returned with her family to Suffolk in 1954. Following a foundation course at Goldsmiths in 1973, Heriz studied at Ravensbourne College of Art and Design from 1974 to 1977. Her subject matter, in particular the human figure, is explored with exceptional energy and invention through sculpture in clay, plaster, cement and bronze, and in recent years in wire, paper, card and board, and in drawings and watercolours. Her figures are filled with experience and emotion. ‘Massed on the shelves in her studio,’ writes Amanda Geitner, ‘they are like a benevolent crowd, quietly and attentively witness to the artist’s life…’

Bridget Heriz Artist Statement: Described as a sculptor’s sculptor, my main concerns are with structure and mass. My principal idea – to affirm life – is equally timeless, as is the principal means of reference to the human form. My concepts arise as the range of experience brought to the studio interacts with the materials and methods being used. Previously explored ideas, structure and/or techniques may be modified by the events of life or something seen, read, debated, felt. I seek integration – ideas with material and process, detail with mass, old with new, art with life – and my practice is therefore largely an intuitive process, however engaged I may be with concepts or issues.