Lawrence Argent
(British, 1957-2017)
Your Move, 2011
Bronze, gray granite and Indian red granite; 143 x 384 x 384 inches
Lawrence Argent’s Your Move depicts three unnaturally large gourds. The concept of the piece relates to notions of education, community, and the individual; all germane to a university campus. Yet the relevance of the gourd form is also significant. The gourd is one of the first plants to be cultivated throughout the world and has been used for thousands of years. It is one of the few plants believed to span the entire globe in prehistoric times and is used in every culture from food to decoration to jewelry. The history behind this plant parallels with university education; as places of education are used in many different ways over the globe. Education is important to societies, just as the gourd once was. Your Move entices the viewer to reflect on the notion of information exchange inherent to modern universities. Moreover, its large-scale format forces a reexamination of familiar objects due to their unexpected size in the same way that higher education opens the eyes of students to expand their world view. The game-like patter on one of the gourds encourages interaction with the piece and accentuates the gourds’ timeless design. Your Move is one of many of Argent’s public artworks. Similar large-scale sculptures can be found in Colorado, California, China, and other locations. Argent received his BA in sculpture from Royal Melbourne Institute of Technology in Australia and his MFA from Rinehart School of Sculpture, which is part of the Maryland Institute College of Art in Baltimore. He was the recipient of the Rosenberry Fund from the University of Denver, where he taught sculpture until his untimely death in 2017. Argent was a Core Fellow at the Museum of Fine Arts, Houston in 1986 and received numerous awards during his distinguished career.
Location
University of Houston
University Lofts
Outdoor Courtyard