Tor

Alex Pain’s 'Tor' was made for the artist’s solo exhibition at Nottingham Castle in 2012. Pain’s work is influenced by minimalist sculpture and modernist architecture. The architectural reference for 'Tor' was the design of the Nottingham Castle’s Ducal Palace, built by the first duke of Newcastle in 1663. Although they are often inspired by existing buildings, Pain’s sculptures are never simple replicas: his original source goes through a stage of considerable ‘distortion and distillation’ before becoming part of a sculpture.

The materials that Pain works with – including foam, wood, copper, glass and gold leaf – reference both the ‘visible’ and ‘invisible’ elements of a building, from the materials used for cladding and insulation to those used for embellishment and decoration. Pain hopes that his sculptures draw attention to the properties of different materials, and encourage his viewers to carry out further ‘material interrogations’.