
Anya Gallaccio: Blessed
Art Outdoors /Anya Gallaccio: Blessed
Known for exploring themes of decay of natural materials, the transitory nature of Gallaccio’s work address the sometimes unsettling and fragile challenges of life cycles. In contrast with using short-lived organic material, Gallaccio also uses more traditional sculptural materials in an attempt to stop the effects of time and preserve living matter.
Blessed confronts the issue of organic impermanence, but in this case, reverses the process by immortalising a tree in bronze and the apples in ceramic, becoming permanently immune to decay. This memorial to a former living object arrives at a price; as the act of casting destroys the tree during the process.
Sited in the Bothy Garden sets up an interesting relationship with the historic fruit trees that line the walls. YSP continues to care for and preserve their legacy, with many of the apple tree varieties around 100 years old, with the first grown here in 1790.
You might also like
- Art Outdoors

Hemali Bhuta: Speed Breakers
- Profile

Matt Howard
YSP/Laureate Fund Poet in Residence - Profile

Jim Brook
WCCD x YSP Residency 2023 - Art Outdoors

Sean Scully: Wall Dale Cubed
Made for YSP, Wall Dale Cubed uses 1000 tonnes of Yorkshire stone from a local quarry and was constructed over many weeks. Importantly to the artist, this colossal work is built in the same way throughout, which connects to ancient stone walls in Ireland, so that ‘when looking at the outside of the block, one can feel the inside without being able to see it’.


