Biography

Richard Holliday Biography

Richard has been working stone by hand since his apprenticeship as a stonemason in 1980. This included study at the Cambridge college of Arts and Technology where he achieved with distinctions his advanced City and Guilds. He was fortunate enough for the opportunity to learn the more sculptural side of this trade within his training which included working with wood. Born in Cambridge in 1963 and surrounded by the precise historical geometry offered fertile ground for his love of the media of stone. His life has always centered around stone and his experiences working on buildings such as Westminster Abbey, Kings College Chapel, and Ely Cathedral to the more modern was the crucible that began the formation of his own ambitions. He formed his own company in Cambridge with three partners in 1989 and continued there for 15 years. He was commissioned in numerous public art and private projects.

Although no more comfortable than with a scant of stone ready to be worked Richard, moved to Cornwall pursue a more individual experimental and speculative way of sculpting. During the past eight years he has converted a late fifties pumphouse into a residence a with studio space and produced and sold many sculptural pieces for private clients. He has a strong belief of things done properly and thoughtfully and that stone can retain a strong voice in the world of fine art. He tutors students in his Studio under his own terms and with the discipline of his own training. His extensive travels and experience in most niches in the world of stone have offered him a very explicit vocabulary of skills to draw from. No subject matter escapes his interest. Some of his work may be semi autobiographic, reflections on society, of life abstracted, but fine line, form and deliberacy tie together his sculptural forms. The forms remain dynamic and clearly retain the energy from the chisel. The peace and quiet of life on the Lizard in Cornwall is very agreeable to Richard and allows him clean fresh meanderings of the mind.