According to Rules and Legend

2015, Bronze - 90% copper wire from Hestercombe House and 10% Tin from pewter tankards donated by Hestercombe’s volunteers.

This works was fabricated during a residency at Hestercombe Gallery and Gardens. The building used to be stately home with grand gardens designed by Sir Edwin Lutyens and Gertrude Jekyll. In the late twentieth century, the house not longer a plausible place of residence, was used by the local council which wonderfully and oddly decided to use it for it’s fire department headquarters. During the 1990’s, more civic and private businesses used the ninety room building, filling it with trunking and cabling to facilitate modern day telecommunication. In 1995, Philip White realised that the over grown foliage surrounding there work place was an important horticultural space and setup up the Hestercombe Gardens Trust to build an archive and restore the gardens to there former glory.

‘According to Rules and Legend’ is how the head gardener described how they have approached this restoration. In 2015, the Trust acquired Hestercombe House and decided to create a public art gallery. The three bronze ingots were formed by melting the old copper telecommunication wires and mixed them with pewter tankards resourced from the volunteer community at Hestercombe, encapsulating the last history of the property and representing the potential of the next chapter.

‘Second Site’ Exhibition catalogue

Each ingot; 6cm x 5cm x 23cm

Taunton, Somerset, UK.

Photography - Paul Blakemore

Commisioner - Hestercombe Gallery and Gardens