Winged Figure by Elisabeth Frink, bronze

From her student days of the 1950s, to the late 1960s, Frink sculpted various winged figures which resembled men and birds as hybrid creatures. These were influenced by her childhood experiences of the Second World War.

Living in Suffolk near several airfields, she witnessed ‘crashes and bombers coming back on fire’ and collected debris and parachute silk as mementoes. At sixteen, she began her first drawings of birds and figures. For her, the sculptures she later developed were suggestive of ‘fractured wings or the debris of war and heroics’, embodying both violence and vulnerability. Signed and editioned no. 1/4. Purchased from the Waddington Galleries in 1974. Copyright: The Executors of the Frink Estate and Archive. All Rights Reserved, DACS.