Frink would use a skeletal framework of chicken wire and metal rods as a base over which she would model with plaster of Paris, liquid or soaked strips of cloth, bulked with card or small pieces of wood. These are gloriously elegant creaturesвЂ¦вЂ™ДЇrink developed her own personal style of bronze patination over a number of years and created her large body of work without the aid of assistants: вЂThis enabled me to have the last word, which was very important to meвЂ™. ThereвЂ™s hardly any detail, but they are so alive that you expect one at any moment to flick a fly away with a swish of its tail or shake of This accounts for their strength and agility. She knew everything about horses,ДЄnd had the ability to sculpt them with both broad confidence and, at the same time, exacting precision. Horses roll over and kick in the grassвЂ¦or they lie down at ease, their legs folded under themвЂ¦This is Frink at her most relaxed. While for Edward Lucie-Smith, the semi-wild horses of the Camargue, вЂwhose resemblance to those in the cave paintings at Lascaux has often been remarked, made an indelible imprint on her imagination.вЂ™ДЄ major theme throughout her career, FrinkвЂ™s horses of the 1980s are represented вЂmuch more quietly, as themselves. The artistвЂ™s biographer, Stephen Gardiner, suggests the sight of VerrocchioвЂ™s equestrian statue of Colleoni and the Roman horses of St MarkвЂ™s on a post-war trip to Italy, set Frink on her chosen path. For Frink, horses represented вЂa multiplicity of meanings вЂ“ masculine and feminine sexuality, wildness, unusual sensitivity and freedom from mental and physical constraintвЂ™. She rode every other day in the fields around her Dorset home, Woolland,Д®xperiencing the physicality of horses immersed in the English countryside. Throughout her career Elisabeth Frink вЂsearched for what it feels like to be, fully, both a human and an animal being, and asked herself repeatedly and unflinchingly about the true nature of life in the face of death.вЂ™ FrinkвЂ™s affinity with nature as a subject and passion for horses in particular stemmed from a rural childhood during which she learnt to ride from a young age and continued into her later years. London, Beaux Arts, Frink, 7th June вЂ“ 8th July 2006 (another cast)ДЄnnette Ratuszniak (ed.), Elisabeth Frink Catalogue RaisonnГ© of Sculpture 1947-93, Lund Humphries in association with the Frink Estate and Beaux Arts, London, 2013, FCR 328, p.163 (another cast illus.) Private collection, UK, acquired from the above

Signed and numbered underneath: Frink 10/10Д«ronze with a brown patina: 7 5/8 x 16 Вѕ x 7 7/8 in / 19.4 x 42.5 x 20 cmД¬onceived circa 1984 and cast by Ken Cook in 1985 in a numbered edition of 10 FrinkвЂ™s affection for horses stemmed from her country childhood in Suffolk her father was a brilliant horseman, a good polo player and an amateur jockey.Thurlow, Suffolk 1930 - 1993 Woolland, Dorset Horse and Jockey was originally commissioned in 1974 by De Beers as the trophy (complete with diamonds) for the King George VI and Queen Elizabeth Stakes-BritainвЂ™s most prestigious annual open-age flat race, which takes place at Ascot in July.

She also received official recognition, being awarded the CBE in 1969, and in 1982 she was created Dame of the British Empire.ДЇrinkвЂ™s work is characterised by her scarred surfaces created by repeatedly coating an armature with wet plaster each coating is distressed and broken, eliminating detail and generalising form. This marked the beginning of a highly acclaimed career in which Frink was awarded Honorary Doctorates by the University of Surrey (1977), Open University (1983), University of Warwick (1983), University of Cambridge (1988), University of Exeter (1988), University of Oxford (1989) and University of Keele (1989). One of the leading lights of the post-war school of British sculptors, Elizabeth Frink achieved commercial success at a young age when, in 1952, Beaux Arts Gallery in London held her first major solo exhibition and the Tate Gallery purchased one work, entitled Bird.

Elisabeth frink