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The Arts Intel Report

David Nash: 45 Years of Drawing

David Nash, Ash Dome Summer, 2021.

13 Rue de Téhéran, 75008 Paris, France

The British sculptor David Nash, 79, works with living trees. Employing a chainsaw, he carves large, curved wood sculptures that become a part of the landscape. In 1977, Nash planted a ring of ash trees to form a vortex-shaped canopy in the middle of a forest in North Wales. He called the work Ash Dome. Now, because of a rare fungus, his Ash Dome is dying. “I’ve been drawing it and I will continue to draw it in its dying years,” he told Artnet in 2018. “I didn’t think I’d lose it in my lifetime.” This exhibition at Galerie Lelong, in collaboration with Annely Juda Fine Art, focuses on Nash’s works on paper and spans 45 years of his groundbreaking career. To create his land art, Nash first sketches his living subjects and learns about them. When the artwork is finished, he keeps tabs on it through the years. —Elena Clavarino