William Tucker

Sculpture and Drawing

William Tucker has been creating sculptures for more than five decades and is one of the most highly esteemed sculptors of our time. In addition to his sculptural work, he is also a prolific writer on the subject of sculpture.

 

With Phillip King and Tim Scott, William Tucker counted among the influential group of British sculptors who were introduced as the New Generation at the eponymous exhibition at London’s Whitechapel Art Gallery in 1965. Their work provided fresh inspiration for the development of abstract sculpture as well as a far broader interpretation of the concept of sculpture. Tucker was invited to show his work at the seminal Primary Structures exhibition at the Jewish Museum in New York in 1966, the defining moment for American Minimal Art.

 

His book The Language of Sculpture, with its idiosyncratic take on modern sculpture from Degas and Rodin to Brancusi and Matisse was published in 1974 to considerable acclaim.

 

Tucker’s recent sculptures take the human form as their reference. Despite their figurative reference, the sculptures are not immediately decipherable or identifiable. Rather, the works open up a wide range of associations, thus achieving their intense, undeniable physicality.

 

His sculptures have a presence that relates to our body and so makes us more aware. As Joy Sleeman suggests in The Sculpture of William Tucker, “Tucker’s sculpture asks fundamental questions as to what sculpture is and what it can be.” (Lund Humphries/The Henry Moore Foundation, 2007).

 

William Tucker was born in Cairo in 1935 and lived in the UK until he moved to the United States in the early 1980s. Initially residing in New York, he later settled in Williamsburg, Massachusetts. Important sculptures from Tucker’s recent period are in the collections of, among others, the Tate Gallery in London, the Guggenheim Museum and Museum of Modern Art in New York, the Nasher Sculpture Center in Dallas and the Art Gallery of New South Wales in Sydney.

‘William Tucker’
William Tucker

Selected Works

William Tucker, ‘Emperor’, 2002
Emperor, 2002
Bronze
William Tucker, ‘Secret’, 2010
Secret, 2010
Bronze
William Tucker, ‘Atreus’, 1987
Atreus, 1987
Bronze
William Tucker, ‘Pomona’, 1999
Pomona, 1999
Bronze
William Tucker, ‘Mask for Hannah’, 2022
Mask for Hannah, 2022
Resin
William Tucker, ‘Mask for Pierre’, 2022
Mask for Pierre, 2022
Bronze
William Tucker, ‘Mask for Michael’, 2022
Mask for Michael, 2022
Bronze
William Tucker, ‘Mask for Edwin’, 2022
Mask for Edwin, 2022
Resin
William Tucker, ‘Mask for Michael’, 2022
Mask for Michael, 2022
Resin
William Tucker, ‘Xanthe’, 1992
Xanthe, 1992
Bronze
William Tucker, ‘Figure Advancing’, 2018
Figure Advancing, 2018
Bronze

News

Gallery Exhibitions

Publications

William Tucker

Born 1935 in Cairo, Egypt

Lives and works in Massachusetts, USA

Education
1959-1960 Studies at St. Martin’s College of Art and Design, London
1955-1958 Studies at University of Oxford, England
Grants and Awards
2011 Elected as honorary National Academician, National Academy Museum, New York
2010  Lifetime Achievement Award, International Sculpture Center, Hamilton
2009  Jack Goldhill Award for Sculpture, Royal Academy of Arts, London
1995  Rodin-Moore Memorial Prize, Second Fujisankei Biennale Hakone Open-Air Museum, Japan
1991  Sculpture Center Award for Distinction in Sculpture
1980 Guggenheim Fellowship

1968-1970

Gregory Fellowship in Sculpture, University of Leeds

Solo Exhibitions

2022
2021
2020
2018
2017
2016
2015
2014
2013
2012
2010
2009
2008
2006
2005
2004
2002
2001
1998
1988
1987

Group Exhibitions

2022
2021
2020
2019
2018
2017
2016
2015
2013
2012
2011
2010
2009
2008
2007
2006
2005
2004
2002
2001
1999
1996
1979
1975
1972
1969
1968
1966
1965
1961
Selected Collections

Aberdeen Art Gallery, Scotland

Arkansas Art Center, Little Rock, AK

Art Gallery of New South Wales, Sydney, Australia

Arts Council of Great Britain, London

British Council, London

The British Museum, London

City of Bilbao, Spain

Contemporary Art Society, London

Florida International University, Miami, FL

Solomon R. Guggenheim Museum, New York

The Hakone Open-Air Museum, Tokyo, Japan

High Museum of Art, Atlanta, GA

Hirshhorn Museum and Sculpture Garden, Washington, D.C.

Kröller-Müller, Otterlo, The Netherlands

Louisiana Museum of Modern Art, Humlebæk, Denmark

The Margulies Collection, Miami

The Metropolitan Museum of Art, New York

The Museum of Fine Arts, Houston

The Museum of Modern Art, New York

National Gallery of Victoria, Melbourne, Australia

Rijksmuseum, Amsterdam, The Netherlands

Storm King Art Center, Mountainville, NY

Peter Stuyvesant Foundation, Newcastle-upon-Tyne, England

Tate Gallery, London

Victoria and Albert Museum, London

Walker Art Center, Minneapolis, MN

Selected Publications
2018 Kosme de Barañano, William Tucker – Mass and Figure, Estudios Durero, 2018
2016 Dieter Schwarz, William Tucker, Kunstmuseum Winterthur, with essays by Julia Kelly, Dieter Schwarz and William Tucker, 2016
2015 Kosme de Barañano, Tucker: Masa y Figura, Museo de Bellas Artes de Bilbao, 2015

2009

Marzio, Peter C. Masterpieces From The Museum of Fine Arts, Houston: Director’s Choice. Yale University Press, New
Haven and London, 2009. Illustrated in color, p.189

2007

Joy Sleeman, The Sculpture of William Tucker, Lund Humphries, England, 2007.

2005

Sculpture from the Sheldon Memorial Art Gallery, edited by Karen O. Janovy, University of Nebraska Press, 2005,
pages 185-187.

2004

A Vision for 21st Century Sculpture, 10 year anniversary book, Sculpture at Goodwood, West Sussex, 2004.

The Sculptural Idea, James J. Kelly, Fourth Edition, Waveland Press, Inc., Long Grove, Illinois, 2004.

2003

Alan Windsor, British Sculptors of the Twentieth Century, Ashgate Publishing Limited, Aldershot, England, 2003.

1999

Michael Auping, House of Sculpture, Modern Art Museum of Fort Worth, TX, 1999, page 12, illustrated page 6.

 

Brooke Barrie, Contemporary Outdoor Sculpture, Rockport Publishers, Gloucester, MA, 1999, pages 152-153.

1998

Tony Birks, The Alchemy of Sculpture, Marston House, 1998.

1996

Irving Sandler, Art of the Postmodern Era: from the late 1960s to the Early 1990s, HarperCollins
Publishers, 1996.

1993

Sam Hunter & John Jacobus, Modern Art, Third Edition, Harry N. Abrams, Inc., New York, 1993, page 337.

1991

Daniel Wheeler, Art Since Mid Century 1945 to the Present, The Vendome Press, New York, 1991.

1985

Dore Ashton, American Art Since 1945, Oxford University Press, New York, 1985.

1984

The Seventh Dalhousie Drawing Exhibition: Actual Size, Dalhousie University, Halifax, Nova
Scotia, Canada, 1984.

John McEwen, Sculptors’ Drawings, The British Council, London 1984.

Frank Gettings, Drawings 1974-84, Hirshhorn Museum & Sculpture Garden, Washington, D.C., 1984.

Judith K. Collischan van Wagner, Reflections: New Conceptions of Nature, Hillwood Art Gallery, Long
Island University, Greenvale, NY, 1984.

1983

Artists Choose Artists II, CDS Gallery, New York, 1983.

Judith K. Collischan van Wagner, Monumental Drawings by Sculptors, Hillwood Art Gallery, Long
Island University, Greenvale, NY, 1983.

1981

Sandy Nairne & Nicholas Serota, ed., British Sculpture in the Twentieth Century, Whitechapel
Art Gallery, London, 1981.

 

John Elderfield, New Work on Paper I, Museum of Modern Art, New York, 1981.

 

Il Luogo della Forma: Nove Scultoi a Castelvecchio, Museo di Castelvecchio, Verona, 1981.

1980

Skulptur im 20. Jahrhundert, Wenkenpark Riehen, Basel, 1980.

1979

The Prospect Mountain Show: An Homage to David Smith, Lake George Arts Project, Lake George, New York, 1979.

1977

William Tucker, Sculptures, Arts Council of Great Britain, London, 1977-1978.

1972

The Condition of Sculpture: A Selection of Recent Sculpture by Younger British and Foreign Artists, Hayward
Gallery Arts, Council of Great Britain, London, 1972.

 

William Tucker, British Pavilion XXXVI Venice Biennale, 1972.

1967

Guggenheim International Exhibition 1967: Sculpture from Twenty Nations, Solomon R. Guggenheim Museum,
New York, 1967.

1966

Sculpture in the Open Air, Greater London Council: Battersea Park, London 1966.