William Turnbull b.1922
Lama, 1961
bronze and rosewood
height 61 inches
unique

Provenance
The Artist
Felix Landau Gallery, USA
Private Collection, USA

Exhibited
Balboa, California, Pavilion Gallery, William Turnbull: Sculpture and Paintings, 13 March - 24 April 1966, cat no.9 illus b/w

Los Angeles, UCLA Art Galleries, Twentieth Century Sculpture from Southern California Collections, 27 February - 14 April 1972, illus

Literature
Herbert Read, Modern Sculpture: A Concise History, Thames & Hudson, London, 2001, cat no. 204, illus colour p 193, first published in 1964 as A Concise History of Modern Sculpture

Amanda A. Davidson, The Sculpture of William Turnbull, The Henry Moore Foundation, Much Hadham, in association with Lund Humphries, Aldershot, 2005, cat no.108, illus b/w p114



In the mid-1950s Turnbull bought a number of rare rosewood logs, these were kept standing like sentries in his studio, and over subsequent years the artist worked them into a beautiful series of totemic sculptures. The original form of the logs were often barely modified, instead they were carved into and assembled in 'stacks' with other materials. These pieces stand directly on the floor and most are human scale, so allowing a close physical relationship between sculpture and viewer.

The bronze top section was clearly made at an earlier stage as it is marked with the artist's stamp and dated 1957. Turnbull made a number of heads around this period and this is likely to be one of these turned through 90 degrees.