An application lodged by the university would see Michael Kenny’s work Original Sin installed in the campus grounds between Derwent College and Heslington Hall.
The gifting of the work to the university has been arranged by Brian Falconbridge, a sculptor and a trustee of the late artist’s estate.
Plans stated the brutalist ethos of the piece by a highly-regarded British sculptor would reflect the modernist features of the Derwent College building.
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The university’s application, lodged with York Council, stated the piece would be made up of three elements each made of Portland stone.
One is a semi-circle with a small indent on flat side at the top and another is a triangle with two rounded edges at the base.
The third is an upright rectange with a circular top.
Plans stated the tallest element, the rectangle, would be around 1.2 metres high.
The work has previously been exhibited outside The Economist Buildings in London and it was also shown as part of a contemporary dance performance.
Kenny’s work is characterised by abstract, figurative and symbolic forms with features which are sensitive to their setting and material.
Sculptures by the artist often deal with isolation in the human condition and feature abstract or depersonalised shapes, along with those of reclining female figures.
The proposed location of Michael Kenny’s Original Sin sculpture, between Block B of Derwent College and Heslington Hall at the University of York. Picture is from Google Street View
One of his works, On Strange and Distant Islands, was a relief which spanned above the eastern portal of London’s Limehouse Link tunnel.
Other pieces were influenced by biblical themes.
His last major series of drawings, The Stations of The Cross, featured a modern reimagining of Jesus Christ’s Passion across 14 mixed-media pieces.
The artist was born in 1941 and studied at the Liverpool College of Art and the Slade School of Fine Art.
He was made a Royal Academician in 1986 and went on to take a number of public commissions and was head of Goldsmiths College’s Department of Fine Arts.
Kenny died in 1999 and is buried in London’s Highgate Cemetery.
Professor Falconbridge, who has arranged the gifting of the sculpture, was also formely the head of Goldsmith’s Department of Fine Arts.
He was also formerly president of the Royal Society of Sculptors.
The University of York’s plans for displaying his sculpture stated it was a carefully considered intervention that would respond well to the buildings and landscape around it.
Plans stated: “Original Sin is a sculptural work by Michael Kenny, a highly-regarded British sculptor known for his contribution to twentieth-century public art and architectural sculpture.
“The sculpture’s brutalist qualities—clarity of form, material truth, and absence of ornament—respond directly to the architectural language of Block B of Derwent College while providing a considered counterpoint to the historic formality of Heslington Hall.”