<
OCT25 SOMETIMES LADY MACBETH POPS BY TO COMPARE LEGS Virginia Leonard
Virginia Leonard’s ceramics sit boldly on the ground. Sometimes Lady Macbeth Pops By To Compare Legs, the heavier/darker of the two works, is bejeweled by wisps and clumps of resin with a painterly slip of pure gold running down one side. Sometimes Hillary Mantel Pops By To Compare Legs, the lighter work, commands its space, its smallness not overwhelmed by its bigger companion, as blue and clear moulded transparencies seemingly slide over its form. In both, the resin is frozen in time, as if in a still photograph, as it is just about to drip.
The black velvet beneath them, sourced material used for filmic backdrops, disappears, and an abyss is opened. The movement of the resin remains paused, about to spill and spoil the surface below or disappear into nothingness. In this space, Virginia’s sculptures shift from 2D planes to 3D floating forms, their elevation constantly shifting and never repeated, echoing the suspension between the light and dark planes of perspective they are poised within.
Virginia’s works contend with their innate fragility of material and form, that becomes heightened as we circumvent their precarious placement just above the ground. As our bodies negotiate the vulnerable edges and corners of the plinth within the architectural space itself, our eyes contend with sculptures’ denial and embrace of gravity.
Virginia Leonard works in Auckland Aotearoa, a ceramic sculpture. She has a Master of Fine Arts from Whitecliffe College of Art and Design. Her work is held in private and public collections internationally and she is represented throughout the world. She won the Woollahra Small Sculpture Prize 2025, Premiere Prize and Officine Saffi Milan Italy in 2021. She is also included in Thames and Hudson London publication of 100 Sculptures of Tomorrow. She has spent time in both Denmark on residency at Guldagergaard- International Research Centre and France at Glass House/Stone House. Next year she will spend 3 months in Rome at c.r.e.t.a on residency.
Presented in collaboration with PAULNACHE
OCT25 SOMETIMES LADY MACBETH POPS BY TO COMPARE LEGS Virginia Leonard
Virginia Leonard’s ceramics sit boldly on the ground. Sometimes Lady Macbeth Pops By To Compare Legs, the heavier/darker of the two works, is bejeweled by wisps and clumps of resin with a painterly slip of pure gold running down one side. Sometimes Hillary Mantel Pops By To Compare Legs, the lighter work, commands its space, its smallness not overwhelmed by its bigger companion, as blue and clear moulded transparencies seemingly slide over its form. In both, the resin is frozen in time, as if in a still photograph, as it is just about to drip.
The black velvet beneath them, sourced material used for filmic backdrops, disappears, and an abyss is opened. The movement of the resin remains paused, about to spill and spoil the surface below or disappear into nothingness. In this space, Virginia’s sculptures shift from 2D planes to 3D floating forms, their elevation constantly shifting and never repeated, echoing the suspension between the light and dark planes of perspective they are poised within.
Virginia’s works contend with their innate fragility of material and form, that becomes heightened as we circumvent their precarious placement just above the ground. As our bodies negotiate the vulnerable edges and corners of the plinth within the architectural space itself, our eyes contend with sculptures’ denial and embrace of gravity.
Virginia Leonard works in Auckland Aotearoa, a ceramic sculpture. She has a Master of Fine Arts from Whitecliffe College of Art and Design. Her work is held in private and public collections internationally and she is represented throughout the world. She won the Woollahra Small Sculpture Prize 2025, Premiere Prize and Officine Saffi Milan Italy in 2021. She is also included in Thames and Hudson London publication of 100 Sculptures of Tomorrow. She has spent time in both Denmark on residency at Guldagergaard- International Research Centre and France at Glass House/Stone House. Next year she will spend 3 months in Rome at c.r.e.t.a on residency.
Presented in collaboration with PAULNACHE