CAC - James Capper

Like Robert Rauschenberg, James Capper sees his artistic practice as that of a reporter of his time as much as a sculptor. His most recent solo show at the Royal Academy of Arts (2024) featured Monitor—a prototype for an eight-metre-long mobile sculpture with four hydraulic legs, inspired by reptilian movement. Designed to traverse water and ice, Monitor enables artists to undertake expeditions and creative work in extreme and remote environments.

Then there are his Rotary Paintings, created using the Hydrapainter—a custom-built studio machine consisting of a square table driven by a hydraulic motor. The device rotates an arm that applies marine paint via a roller in a continuous loop across the surface of the paper. Each work is titled after a confiscated Russian super yacht—a pointed reflection on the current geopolitical climate and the West’s resolve in the wake of the invasion of Ukraine, or a newspaper headline during the pandemic.