Portrait of M. (Primary Title)
Elizabeth King, American, born 1950 (Artist)
"Our ancient habit is still to conceive our head as our private chamber, a room we furnish and whose occupant is us." —Elizabeth King
King’s sculptures merge realistic portraiture with the uncanny. King bases them on direct observation, but she has also studied articulated mannequins, 18th-century automata, and Japanese Bunraku puppets. Her small figures have a surprising capacity to suggest thought and emotion.
King’s precisely detailed Portrait of M. reflects her mastery of various crafts: she cast the head in porcelain herself, carving its features further after removing it from the mold. Hyper-real, yet less than half the size of an actual head, this work examines the human form in an intimate and unsettling way.
Transformed Reality, Virginia Museum of Fine Arts, Richmond, VA, February 18 – May 16, 1993
Contemporary Sculpture form the VMFA Collection, Bayly Art Museum, University of Virginia, Charlottesville, VA, March 21 – May 24, 1992
Contemporary Sculpture in the Collection of the VMFA, Virginia Museum of Fine Arts, Richmond, VA, June 25 – August 11, 1991
Un/Common Ground: Virginia Artists 1990, Virginia Museum of Fine Arts, Richmond, VA, October 23 – December 16, 1990
Process/Image/Portrait: Recent Sculpture by Myron Helfgott, Elizabeth King, Genna Watson, Virginia Museum of Fine Arts, Richmond, VA, June 9 – July 20, 1986
[1] Accessioned December 17, 1986. See VMFA Curatorial file.
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