THE SHADOW SELF

There’s always a moment soon after entering a city park or a green urban space when the temporary spell of calm begins to fade, as the orchestra of noise we’d managed to ignore makes its insidious return. And so too, here, beyond the peaceful birdsong of the garden, lies another reality; the background hum of the city reminding us of our unfolding collective creation, with its influx of roaring sports cars, honking horns, whirring sirens and endless building works. Yet the reverberations of hammering and clanging metal merge with the garden’s gentle tones to create a very apt soundtrack to Thomas Houseago’s work. 

In Janus (Mirror Figure) (2025), a carved redwood tree that had been “struck down by lightning” before Houseago came at it with a chainsaw is cradled by balconies of sweet-smelling horse chestnut blossoms. A hardened bronze figure is protected by a balcony of jasmine, as fuzzy bees hover past towards the scent of nectar in his 2011 work Cave/Rock Head III. A heavy-set figure poised with questions is bolted into place like Frankenstein’s monster in Aluminium construction No.1(Giant) (2008). And in Large Walking Figure I (Leeds) (2013), a five-metre figure towering above us is caught mid-stride, walking alongside a group of trees (including Houseago’s favourite, pine, the first tree to be planted in the garden). Like an ally of JRR Tolkien's “Ents” hybridised from bits of machinery found in Mordor, marching into battle to take on the surrounding multi-story towers, its gaping holes-for-eyes implore us to stare straight through them into the urban infrastructure behind as it contemplates its own reflection.

Houseago spoke of his walking figure: “Anne [Pontégnie, the exhibition curator] has placed it in this water, surrounded by these trees. You see the city, you see some of the buildings. In a weird way, because it’s shown so classically, the awkward, ‘anti-monument’ quality of it pops more.”

Pontégnie clearly had this relationship in mind when setting them in place. “Sculpture is something that needs to be perceived from every angle and every side. In a museum, it’s not always easy to achieve, but in a garden every sculpture can breathe,” she explained. “The sculptures can seem very powerful in their language, but also express a lot of vulnerability… They’re looking for hope. I thought that was a beautiful thing to explore.”

For some, the white box of a gallery provides a neutral backdrop that allows work to speak for itself. In 16th-century Europe, the first Protestant reformers believed they were purging the world of the Catholic patrons’ devilish mess of “popish idol-trash” – a phrase commonly used at the time – only to inadvertently create one of the first hardcore minimalist aesthetics in history. By popularising the stripped-back version of the icon-loaded crucifix sans-Christ, they made way for a “logo culture” of the cross, today the most recognisable symbol of Christianity worldwide.

Those who might be tempted, in a setting like this, to ignore or erase any of the bystanders with the help of their AI-integrated phone camera, or keep the surrounding scenery out of shot would be missing the point of the work: to generate connection. As he explains, “Art is a very unique space. You don’t find that in entertainment, you don't find that in shopping… we also have to make room for this discussion about who we really are, how do we really feel? Not some image of how we should feel, but really, how do we feel?”

At the opening, Houseago discussed how, over the past 50 years, a wedge has been put between the public and the art world. “The art world can be its own island, and start assuming that art is just for this group of people that go to the biennales and the art fairs, and that’s art. But actually art should be as reachable to people as music, as movies.I always think about this from Picasso during the Second World War. Paris was occupied by the Nazis and he was making these really dark paintings… An SS officer looked at this work, and he said to Picasso, “Did you do this?” Picasso said, “No, you did.”

The shame that follows in the footsteps of abuse and violence of all kinds is something Houseago has always been open about throughout his career. At one point, he described some of the mark-making on one of the sculptures as “like a diary entry.” He opened up about the shame he felt just before the show’s opening, admitting he even tried to change it at the last minute.

“I had a very hard time accepting this show for myself. I found it uncomfortable. I felt like something was being revealed that I really didn’t want to reveal… But I was in the Prado yesterday with Goya’s black paintings… and this disconnect between the mask and the face; what’s real, what’s not; how the bodies are both animals and monsters… made me feel not quite as weird, or as embarrassed or ashamed of this show, because I thought, there is this tradition, and it’s important.” 

Traditions there certainly are. “Here we have the horrors of war and Guernica in this city,” he continued. “If I look at war, and look at what’s going on in the world, it’s all trauma loops. I think art is saying, ‘Be careful.’”

As we approached his most recent work, Janus (Mirror Figure) (2025), a disjointed two-headed figure with deep scars, carved from a lightning-struck tree, Houseago spoke about his somatic approach to making this sculpture, partially informed by Dutch psychiatrist Bessel van der Kolk’s book The Body Keeps the Score (2014).

“I’m very interested in the parts of ourselves that we often don’t talk about or represent, which are the vulnerabilities, the animal qualities of us, the elemental energy that runs through our bodies. It’s not a beautiful sculpture, I understand that, but I think there's a vulnerability in the sculpture that isn’t in some of the others.”

The sculpture has two faces, which are separated from the body, sticking out at awkward angles and attached with what look like heavy-duty construction staples. To me, the work is an embodiment of Edison’s assertion, “The chief function of the body is to carry the brain around”. Like a cult member slowly starting to come to terms with the damage done by the ideologies they’ve lived by, our world’s collective shadow is beginning to contemplate how to retrieve itself from the coercive control of its figurehead’s Cartesian wiles, after some centuries-long rampage going round taking a proverbial axe to as many heads as possible. 

Houseago in this scenario, I imagine, is the non-judgmental sage, offering to guide us through recovery, presenting us with questions, and his own experience as balm. He is an artist who knows firsthand about healing, as the world surely could, if we’d only learn how to listen to our artists again.

Thomas Houseago. Esculturas., 1st May – 30th, October 2026 Jardin Banca March, Madrid