Stunningly dynamic sporting sculptures from Sophie Dickens

Figurative sculpture treads a fine line between gallery and garden centre sometimes, but Sophie Dickens gets it bang on. She was commissioned to make a judo sculpture for the Olympic Judo Centre ahead of this summer’s games, and has gone on to create a bronze sporting series to go on show at the Sladmore Contemporary in May. Sophie has a real pedigree as a sculptor having won the V&A Sculpture Prize in 2007, but it’s her attention to detail that seems to raise her work above the norm. She took an anatomy course to better understand how the human body works and when she was commissioned for the Olympic piece she spent hours studying judo moves so as to better recreate them. The results are extraordinarily dynamic pieces that appear frozen in time, as though the White Witch had gotten furious in a 2012 training camp (she turned people to stone, it’s not that tenuous a reference!)

The show runs from May 1 to June 9.