Shaun Gagg

Shaun was born in the year 1969. He grew up in the mining village of Wombwell, near Barnsley in Yorkshire. During school, he always enjoyed art and was fascinated by Salvador Dali’s work.

Shaun one day found himself working on a roof, replacing the old tiles. This progressed him to becoming a full-time roofer. He then got introduced to a magical metamorphic rock of sedimentary origin; slate. The slate companies who supplied him would often bring skips which were piled to the top with large pieces. The guys would often say “Take as much as tha want’s, lad.”, Shaun considered this music to his ears.

Shaun would often take weekly trips to Wales. These journeys would show Shaun slate tips the size of mountains! Slates are what inspired Shaun to start his sculpturing. This is how his life was for the next 15 years. He’d create the odd sculpture now and again from slate or sometimes even large lumps of sandstone! People who saw these sculptures would often make comments like ‘they’re very Barbara Hepworth, aren’t they?’. Although, Shaun didn’t even know who she was at this point!

He eventually discovered that some of her work was displayed at Yorkshire Sculpture Park, less than ten miles from where he lived. These visits to Y.S.P. also introduced Shaun to the work of Henry Moore, and he found aspects of similarity to his own work.

However, the most influential sculptor he discovered there was Andy Goldsworthy. Andy’s balanced land art became an obsession. This led Shaun to the shallows of the nearby reservoirs of the Peak District, where he would sit in the water balancing as many as 6 or 7 large rocks with just millimetres of contact points between each one!

12 years ago, Shaun moved to the coast of Flamborough near Bridlington. Here he continued his land art where his playground was the cobbled beaches. He was often in the local paper, or at least his art was. For quite a while the newspapers were curious as to who was creating these sculptures. ‘Mysterious Artist Strikes Again’ was a common caption above a photograph of his sculptures. Shaun then found a small workshop and decided to have a go at sculpting full time; making large abstract slate pieces.

When Shaun’s wife and family were asked to describe his work, they said “he has to go over the top and make everything twice as big as it needs to be”. This trait eventually became Shaun’s downfall as his left leg eventually gave up due to the weight of the slates he had been carrying around for his sculptures. His leg already had pins and a metal plate from an old climbing accident. By the end of a long day working on the slate, he would be limping badly and in a lot of pain. He even constructed an external metal calliper which went from under the heel of his boot up to his knee and was strapped to his leg. This helped in two ways; not only did it take the pressure off his ankle, but it also made him dig out his welder to make it.

Shaun has never looked back and for the last five years, he has made nothing but welded sculptures. Whereas before, the natural shape of the stone dictated the final form of the finished sculpture, with welding Shaun can let his imagination run wild and make practically anything.

Shaun still goes over the top and makes everything as big as possible, because after all, he’s a Yorkshireman and so value for money is everything, even in art!