Mizunara Bowl

Many of Nash's sculptures explore our dependence on nature – and specifically wood – for basic survival tools and utensils. Mizunara Bowl is one such work. It was made from the trunk of a mizunara or Japanese oak in northern Japan. The oak's lighter sapwood forms a natural edge to the bowl.

Date and material

• 1994
• Mizunara oak

The bowl is one piece of wood, it speaks outwards and also receives, it contains this big space – a bit like a satellite dish – it is a receiver and an expresser. This was the particular shape that I was looking for.

David Nash

Creating art that 'speaks'

Mizunara Bowl is made from a single piece of wood, the 'bowl' sitting on a 'table'. Nash describes the tipped-up form of the bowl as 'speaking outward' towards Throne in the centre of the glasshouse. He has also placed this work as a greeting to the Temperate House exhibition.

Working in all weathers

Nash describes himself as 'an all-weather artist', and that was certainly the case in the making of Mizunara Bowl, where he had to work in the snow! He says, 'This wood had been in a wood yard for many years – no one wanted it as it had big cracks in it, and nearly all the sapwood had rotted off. I was happy to get it though.'

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