Steven Gregory

Description

"Would you care to dance, Mrs Hippo?", "Certainly, sir!" she said. Round and round they went, their fat blubbery forms appearing to have the lightness of thistledown as they spun across the the ballroom floor. Occasionally the rattle of a teacup punctuated the Valse des Fleurs. Other couples, shuffling or treading on each other's feet, looked in awe at the pair, marvelling at their dimension as well as the precision of their movement. Totally at one, they danced the afternoon away. The medium of music and the location of the Mecca dance hall, every Tuesday and Thursday afternoon, from three until five-thirty, gave escape to this couple who, in their everyday lives, would lumber for the bus and strain to enter the Underground train before the door closed.

In this sculpture Steven Gregory has given lightness to volume, and in so doing has given a lie to the density and weight of bronze. If we look at this two-piece sculpture in terms of composition, rhythm, volume, mass, texture and colour it works, formally. A harmonious whole, the composition satisfies from every point of view. Form is accentuated by texture, careful colouring and tonal rendering of the patina. The open flowers of the lips are sensual whilst conveying a notion of vacuousness and mystery. The intimate touch of this pair appears tentative and polite, their toes enjoying the closest contact. What are these creatures? They are the product of Gregory's imagination, and revealed themselves first in a drawing which came, he thinks, but cannot be sure, from his fascination with a television wildlife programme about the hippopotamus. These lumbering, ungainly creatures on land took on qualities of utmost grace when in water. As an idea for a sculpture, this notion would work in abstract form. Steven Gregory, however, has chosen to present his sculptural ideas in a figurative mode whilst imbuing them with qualities of humour and ridicule.