Jesse Wine Time's Arrow
Jesse Wine’s new cycle of sculptures move in two directions, materially and conceptually. At once involved with the pull of memory and imagination as well as mass and the drag of gravity on bodies. Wine’s use of material creates this dialectic, with the show utilising a productive disjuncture between his more established work in clay and a newer body of work in bronze which the artist began following the loss of his father. The latter capture the sense of a renewed gaze, with attention paid to the poignancy to be found in the placement of objects and in small details. They have a lightness, incorporating casts of thin, intricate forms which often float or appear in suspension. In contrast, clay – itself the product of compacted force and compression – is used to depict bodies pulled down by their own heft. Together, the installation can be understood as bringing together notions of physical and spiritual pressure, alluding to the way our minds and bodies are often shaped by forces and events out of our control.
Metaphors and idioms around weight provide a framework for various philosophical issues: one can wear something lightly or let matters weigh heavily; people can tread lightly; you can carry the weight of the world on your shoulders. Wine’s sculptures invoke such figurative frames to convey the interconnectedness of the physical and psychological. The dual associations of lightness and heaviness – lightness as freedom but also fickleness, and weight’s connection to both meaning and inflexibility – are at the heart of his existential sculptures. The works cycle through these ideas and articulate the inherent interplay of desire and constraint in our lives. The exhibition title communicates these concerns, alluding to the downward pressure of gravity on the human form as well as an awareness of clock time and aging. The relationship between Wine’s painted and coated clay figures and the various heady stage-set bronzes captures this dynamic, setting out the relationship between our inner lives and physical bodies.
Untitled, 2025
Ceramic, sand, paint, wood
Overall: 180.4 x 63.5 x 48.3 cm, 71 x 25 x 19 in, Sculpture: 91.4 x 63.5 x 48.3 cm, 36 x 25 x 19 in
To be and/ or not to be, 2025
Ceramic, graphite, paint, wood
Overall: 177.9 x 58.5 x 58.4 cm, 70 x 23 x 23 in, Sculpture: 88.9 x 58.4 x 58.4 cm, 35 x 23 x 23 in
Untitled, 2025
Ceramic, copper, paint, wood
Overall: 175 x 63.5 x 50.8 cm, 68 7/8 x 25 x 20 in, Sculpture: 86.4 x 63.5 x 50.8 cm, 34 x 25 x 20 in
Futures, 2025
Bronze, 4 Parts
Orchid: 158.5 x 25 x 16 cm, 62 3/8 x 9 7/8 x 6 1/4 in, Oak: 155 x 26 x 16 cm, 61 x 10 1/4 x 6 1/4 in, Ginco: 155 x 25 x 15 cm, 61 x 9 7/8 x 5 7/8 in, Corn: 141.5 x 27 x 16.5 cm, 55 3/4 x 10 5/8 x 6 1/2 in
Speeches, 2025
Bronze
183 x 143 x 70 cm, 72 x 56 1/4 x 27 1/2 in, Edition of 3 plus 2 artist's proofs
Jesse Wine (b 1983, Chester, England) lives and works in Brooklyn, New York. Selected solo exhibitions include: ‘Both’, The Modern Institute, Aird’s Lane Bricks Space, Glasgow (2022); ‘Carve a hole in the rain for yer’, The Modern Institute, Osborne Street, Glasgow (2021); ‘Imperfect List’, Sculpture Center, New York (2020); ‘Prosper, Phantom Limb’, Simone Subal Gallery, New York (2017); ‘Young man red’, Gemeentemuseum, Den Haag, The Netherlands (2016); ‘Working title, not sure yet’, Mary Mary, Glasgow (2016); ‘Wonderful Audience Member’, Soy Capitán, Berlin (2016). Selected group exhibitions include: ‘Énormément bizarre’, The Centre Pompidou, Paris (2025); ‘A Través’, James Cohan, New York (2022); ‘Further Thoughts on Earthy Materials’, GAK, Bremen (2018); ‘Lynda Benglis, Erika Verzutti, Jesse Wine’, Fortes D’Aloia & Gabriel, Rio de Janeiro (2017); ‘Regarding George Ohr: Contemporary Ceramics in the Spirit of the Potter’, Boca Raton Museum of Art, Florida (2017); Battersea Power Station and CASS Sculpture Foundation – Powerhouse Commission, London (2017); ‘That Continuous Thing: Artists and the Ceramics Studio, 1920 – Today’, TATE St Ives, Cornwall (2017); ‘Jesse Wine | Peter Voulkos’, Parrasch Heijnen, Los Angeles (2017); ‘Sludgy Portrait of Himself’, Museum of Cambridge, Cambridge, UK (2017); ‘Paul Heyer, Jeanette Mundt, Jesse Wine’, Andrea Rosen Gallery, New York, (2016); ‘Luster – Clay in Sculpture Today’, Fundament Foundation, Tilburg, The Netherlands (2016).