John Chamberlain

Timothy Taylor presents an exhibition of sculptures by John Chamberlain (1927–2011) at its London space. The presentation will feature works created between the 1960s and 2000s, providing insight into the artist’s six-decade career. Ranging in size from tabletop to large-scale, the works in this exhibition exemplify Chamberlain’s sculptural choreographies of balance and rhythm, exertion, and velocity.

In the late 1950s, Chamberlain came to prominence for his sculptures hewn from the remnants of junked automobiles. Bringing gestural Abstract Expressionism into three dimensions, he took an emotionally liberated and instinctual approach to his assemblages of car hoods, bumpers, fenders, and fins. He used the term “fit” to describe his mode of composing, which was improvised and spontaneous, prioritising inevitable and organic solutions to formal problems. Thinking in terms of volume, Chamberlain created works that unfold as the viewer moves around them; their surfaces, marked and patinated by their former lives on the road, tell additional stories and incorporate the conceptual dimensions of the pop readymade.