About Peter
Drawing on varied interests including history, political philosophy and storytelling; Peter Hanmer creates allegorical, dystopian and strangely disturbing sculptural works. His work reflects his interest in the power of art as a cultural and political critique; as described by the literary theorist Terry Eagleton:
…one of the great humanist functions of culture is to open some daylight between its self and the rest of our social practices and institutions so it could actual operate as a critique of them .[1]
In May 2018 Peter unveiled Plato’s Lair a site-specific installation at Cheeseburn Sculpture Garden in Northumbria, UK, commissioned as part of the Gillian Dickinson North East Young Sculptor of The Year award 2017. The work is heavily influenced by Plato’s story The Allegory of the Cave featured in Plato’s seminal work The Republic.
Within the large Victorian potting shed in the grounds of the centuries old Cheeseburn Grange House and Gardens a miniature society of bird like figures resides. Some seem content to watch television or picnic in the damp and dusty gloom, while others desperately try to escape into the sunlight looking for life beyond the potting shed. Guards police all the exits however and tyrannical leaders direct events in this tiny dictatorship.
In the Allegory of the Cave Plato asks us to imagine people shackled all their lives facing the wall of a cave where flickering shadows play; how this would become their only reality. The allegory is intended to provoke questions about the nature of reality; how we believe we know the world through our experience of it, but that this may be subliminally or forcefully influenced and distorted. Peter’s figurative works aim to test and often satirise accepted wisdom and conventional truths. Human constructs such as the hierarchy of human over animal for example. The otherness of the birdlike beings provides a distance for the viewer who observes a different yet identifiable character; an allegory for themselves, therefore transforming the potting shed into miniature replication of their own society.
Peter was born in 1992 in Northumberland where he is currently based. He studied at the University of the Creative Arts in Farnham, where he received a BA (Hons) in Fine Art in May 2014. He has gone on to complete a residency in his home county at the whistle art stop in Haltwhistle (2015) and has exhibited his work at a variety of galleries and venues both locally and internationally. Select group exhibitions include, Digital Citizen – The Precarious Subject, Baltic Centre for Contemporary Art (2019) The Discerning eye, Mall Galleries, London (2014); Modern Panic VI, Apiary Studios, London (2015); FLUX Exhibition, The Royal College of Art, London (2015); utopia:dystopia, Fringe Arts Bath Festival (2016); and MFA Connect, Victoria University, Victoria, Canada, (2018). In May 2018 Peter opened Plato’s Lair, a site-specific installation at Cheeseburn Sculpture Garden in Northumbria, UK, commissioned as the winner of the Gillian Dickinson North East Young Sculptor of The Year award 2017. He graduated with Distinction from the MFA Fine Art program at Newcastle University in September 2018.
[1] iqsquared. Terry Eagleton in Conversation with Roger Scruton. Accessed July 17, 2018. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qOdMBDOj4ec.
All animal bones used in my bone sculpture series are legally and ethically sourced, and have mostly been found by me on walks in my home county of Northumberland. Works containing real animal bone are for display only and are not for sale unless noted by work.
…one of the great humanist functions of culture is to open some daylight between its self and the rest of our social practices and institutions so it could actual operate as a critique of them .[1]
In May 2018 Peter unveiled Plato’s Lair a site-specific installation at Cheeseburn Sculpture Garden in Northumbria, UK, commissioned as part of the Gillian Dickinson North East Young Sculptor of The Year award 2017. The work is heavily influenced by Plato’s story The Allegory of the Cave featured in Plato’s seminal work The Republic.
Within the large Victorian potting shed in the grounds of the centuries old Cheeseburn Grange House and Gardens a miniature society of bird like figures resides. Some seem content to watch television or picnic in the damp and dusty gloom, while others desperately try to escape into the sunlight looking for life beyond the potting shed. Guards police all the exits however and tyrannical leaders direct events in this tiny dictatorship.
In the Allegory of the Cave Plato asks us to imagine people shackled all their lives facing the wall of a cave where flickering shadows play; how this would become their only reality. The allegory is intended to provoke questions about the nature of reality; how we believe we know the world through our experience of it, but that this may be subliminally or forcefully influenced and distorted. Peter’s figurative works aim to test and often satirise accepted wisdom and conventional truths. Human constructs such as the hierarchy of human over animal for example. The otherness of the birdlike beings provides a distance for the viewer who observes a different yet identifiable character; an allegory for themselves, therefore transforming the potting shed into miniature replication of their own society.
Peter was born in 1992 in Northumberland where he is currently based. He studied at the University of the Creative Arts in Farnham, where he received a BA (Hons) in Fine Art in May 2014. He has gone on to complete a residency in his home county at the whistle art stop in Haltwhistle (2015) and has exhibited his work at a variety of galleries and venues both locally and internationally. Select group exhibitions include, Digital Citizen – The Precarious Subject, Baltic Centre for Contemporary Art (2019) The Discerning eye, Mall Galleries, London (2014); Modern Panic VI, Apiary Studios, London (2015); FLUX Exhibition, The Royal College of Art, London (2015); utopia:dystopia, Fringe Arts Bath Festival (2016); and MFA Connect, Victoria University, Victoria, Canada, (2018). In May 2018 Peter opened Plato’s Lair, a site-specific installation at Cheeseburn Sculpture Garden in Northumbria, UK, commissioned as the winner of the Gillian Dickinson North East Young Sculptor of The Year award 2017. He graduated with Distinction from the MFA Fine Art program at Newcastle University in September 2018.
[1] iqsquared. Terry Eagleton in Conversation with Roger Scruton. Accessed July 17, 2018. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qOdMBDOj4ec.
All animal bones used in my bone sculpture series are legally and ethically sourced, and have mostly been found by me on walks in my home county of Northumberland. Works containing real animal bone are for display only and are not for sale unless noted by work.