b. 1988, York, England

Cast in bronze, iron, and aluminium, Rory Menage’s spectacular sculptures seem products of a bygone era, albeit infused with a distinctly twentieth-century, Cubist aesthetic. Menage takes inspiration from the imagery of ancient Egypt, most notably Ramesses II, the fourteenth-century BC Egyptian Pharaoh. Also known as ‘Ozymandias’, or the King of Kings, Ramesses II and the grandeur of his legacy shape Menage’s phlegmatic figures, which the artist installs and photographs in the Yorkshire countryside. Indeed, Menage’s representation of the human condition follows a tradition of Yorkshire sculptors whose work conjures forth ideas of landscape, language, history and archaeology.

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