Description

Tony Heaton OBE is a practising sculptor, chair of Shape Arts and consultant / advisor to many major cultural organisations, including the British Council, Tate and the Research Centre for Museums and Galleries. He is the initiator of the National Disability Arts Collection and Archive (NDACA). His sculpture Gold Lamé recently occupied the Liverpool Plinth and his Monument to the Unintended Performer was installed on the Big 4 at the entrance to the Channel 4 Television Corporation’s London headquarters in celebration of the 2012 Paralympic Games. His sculpture Squarinthecircle? is situated outside Portsmouth University’s School of Architecture. He was awarded an OBE in the 2013 Queen’s Birthday Honours for services to the arts and the disability arts movement and has an alumni award from Lancaster University and honorary doctorates from both the University of Leicester and Bucks New University. More information is available at www.tonyheaton.co.uk.

The artist writes about his BAMS medal: ‘Father and Child is a return to a Portland stone carving I did some years ago. I thought it would also work in tondo. It’s a memory of when my daughter was learning to walk and she would stand on my knees and then start to climb up to my shoulders. It was quite physical, different from the often passive mother and son depictions.’