As I enter the gallery I encounter the back of a naked woman. Only slightly larger than life, she stands heavy-footed in front of me. Her hands raise up to cradle the weight of her weary head. She is motionless. She is a moment in time, her time: her time as a woman on the edge of motherhood.
There is a sense of frozen urgency, her body extends beyond its own imagination. This universally natural thing is now somehow shockingly real. There will be pain and the passing of fluids. There will be cries of anguish, desperation, retribution. All this imminent passion, this perfectly unfiltered womanhood is so there before me, so implied, like the noiseless tremble before the avalanche.
This weight bearing down on her is somehow transferred to me as I walk around to face her. The languid weariness in her eyes draws out a spark of empathy from me and from the others, also watching and waiting. We are frozen in this moment of pre-birth, this altar that waits for every mother, this is our animal truth.
But wait, this is a sculpture in a gallery. This sudden realisation of artifice releases us. We process the encounter, our very human encounter and move on reluctantly, glancing back still waiting for what will happen next.
This group of 15 of Ron Mueck’s hyper-realistic sculptures represents a large proportion of his output. Over the last few decades he has produced close to 50 sculptures. They vary from miniature to gigantic. The execution, the detail, the realism is just about perfect, every hair in place. This Australian artist now living in a remote part of the Isle of Wight has slowly, steadily, risen to the heights of international appreciation. His work is collected by the world’s premier institutions and has drawn record crowds. He is showing two works for the very first time.
The latest, called “Havoc”, shows his evolution toward a more gestural approach. Exacting surface detail has given way to ripples of inner intensity distorting the body. There are two packs of dogs confronting each other with bared teeth and ferocious body language. It is the moment before battle. It is the moment in which havoc will be unleashed irreversibly. Is this the world we find ourselves in now?
Showing at the Art Gallery of NSW’s new building, Naala Badu, Lower Level 2 until April 12, 2026.
Your humanity will be delighted, will be tested, surprised and altered but certainly moved by this very human encounter.
