Philip Hearsey

Philip Hearsey has spent more than 30 years working as an architectural, interior and furniture designer. From this he has developed an enduring interest in working with wood and metal in all forms and the making of highly individual furniture and accessories.  He left Camberwell School of Art to go into the building a joining industry, before turning to design in 1975.  His passion is British hardwoods combined with hand-forged iron and steel, bronze in particular; stone and many other materials have also found an important place in his work.  Whereas bronze is most commonly used to reproduce a work originally conceived in another medium, Philip uses the sand-casting process to create vessel forms that honour and explore the qualities of bronze as a material in its own right. As an architect / designer, reference to constructed form is inevitable: paradoxically he is most powerfully inspired by the natural landscape and sense of place of the Herefordshire/Welsh borders where he lives and works.

At the simplest level, using the basic vocabulary of ovals, circles and triangles, and their solid 3D counterparts, he creates elegant objects that do not rely solely upon their intrinsic beauty but possess an essential presence and resonance.

The rim is critical; it is the interface between the container and that which is contained, it is most usually bright polished and not only reveals the beauty, colour and solidity of the material but crucially exemplifies any asymmetry or dichotomy between the outer surface of the piece as a whole, the "container", and the space or void that is contained. Philip is also intrigued by the surface and the alchemy of patination, not because of any obsession with technique but because the possibilities are challenging, unpredictable and seemingly endless. The colouring is not a coating, it is the surface itself: it is the result of a self-transformation of the material, by the material, and the coloured surface, even if it becomes encrusted, is a manifestation and celebration of the bronze itself.