Antony Gormley in front of ‘Matrix III’, one of his installation pieces.
Antony Gormley is a prominent British artist best known for his large-scale sculptures and installations which explore the relationship between humans and the spaces they inhabit within nature and the cosmos.
Gormley’s sculptures have been widely exhibited across Britain and the rest of the world, yet he has also worked in other media, and interest in his drawings and prints has grown steadily in recent years. His prints are often based on the same ideas and principles that inspire his sculptures, and they’re especially popular in the United Kingdom, where they are usually sold at auction for prices ranging between £500 and £5,000.
If you believe you own an Antony Gormley print, and you’d like to find out more about how to sell it, please contact Mark Littler today. Below is a list of Antony Gormley’s eight most expensive prints.
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Breathe
Antony Gormley’s own body is often key to his work, and this unique print from 2016 is no exception. It was sold by Bonhams in March 2022 for £55,000, and it comes from a series created for the CAST exhibition at the Alan Cristea Gallery in London. To make the prints, Gormley covered himself in a mixture of crude oil, linseed oil, and petroleum jelly, then proceeded to lower himself onto a sheet of handmade paper with the help of two assistants and two very long poles. The result is a strange, life-sized ghostly imprint of his own body surrounded by a pale shadow that almost looks like some kind of halo.
In many ways, the print is an exploration of fossil fuels and our dependence on them (Gormley has said he’s worried about his own carbon footprint). But it also has a religious dimension, which is hardly surprising, given the artist’s Catholic background and in-depth exploration of Buddhism as a young man.
“Breathe” Sold by Bonhams in 2022
Bodies In Space (Black)/Bodies In Space (White)
The principal theme behind the majority of Antony Gormley’s work – the relationship between bodies and space – is also the driving force behind these two lithographs. They were sold as a pair by Sotheby’s in March 2023 for £17,000, more than doubling their estimate of £6,000 to £8,000.
The images each depict a human body, but one that can only just be made out among the splatters of dark or light dots that populate the paper. In Gormley’s own words, “My stretched body makes a shadow within a random field of dropped oil or carbon: a test site.”
“Bodies in Space” Sold by Sotheby’s in 2023
Bearing Light Portfolio
This is a series of 12 simple but striking prints which Antony Gormley described as “a response to the physical act of printing.” The series was sold by Lama for £7,270 in October 2021. Each print was made by pressing inked plywood plates onto paper using very high pressure, resulting in a series of bold, black shapes contrasted by their white backgrounds. It was a method that allowed the grain of the plywood to be clearly visible within the black silhouettes, something which, according to Gormley, was “very important,” and which gives some texture to the otherwise stark prints.
“Bearing Light Pofolio” Sold by Lama in 2021
Space
Gormley’s love of simple lines and bold colour contrasts is again clear to see in this 2007 lithograph, which was sold by Sotheby’s in March 2021 for £6,500. Unusually for Gormley, this abstract print contains no humans, although one could argue the white lines represent a figure with their arms outstretched, perhaps echoing the crucifixion. But despite the lack of human beings, Gormley still explores the way that space can be used, this time in the interplay of the light and dark areas of the paper.
“Space” Sold by Sotheby’s in 2021
Domain
This print dates from 2000, and it was sold by Philips in January 2021 for £6,000. The print has many similarities to Gormley’s Domains sculptural series from 1999-2003, in which the artist wanted “to escape the boundary of the skin and to acknowledge the body as a place of transformation.”
In the sculptures, Gormley used stainless steel rods and a loose set of rules to create large human figures, eventually trying to use “the least amount of material necessary to convey the attitude of the body, while still allowing it to stand.” The criss-crossing lines of the print echo these steel rods, and the faceless figure contains many similarities with the sculptures.
“Domain” Sold by Philips in 2021
Horizon Field
This etching was sold by Phillips in September 2023 for £5,500, and it was inspired by Antony Gormley’s installation project of the same name from 2010-2012, which, according to Gormley, was “the first art project of its kind.”
The project involved placing 100 life-sized, cast-iron sculptures of human beings across an area of 150 square kilometres in Austria. The figures created a horizontal line at 2,039 metres above sea level, which is “an altitude that is readily accessible, but at the same time, lies beyond the realm of everyday life.”
“Horizon Field” Sold by Philips in 2023
Standing Matter
This etching was sold by Christie’s in May 2016 for £4,800. It bears the same name as a 2003 exhibition of Gormley’s work which was held in Austria, and which reflected Gormley’s fascination with “the body as a zone of becoming: transfusing, building, starting, feeling.”
The “matrices of architecture, molecular biology, quantum mechanics, and virtual imaging” all strongly influenced the pieces for the exhibition. The circular shapes which create the figure in this particular print are, indeed, reminiscent of molecular biology, and the image is also clearly influenced by sculptures from the exhibition, such as Standing Matter I.
“Standing Matter” Sold by Christies in 2016
Another Place
Some of Antony Gormley’s best known sculptures and installations include the Angel of the North in Gateshead, and Another Place, which is a series of 100 cast iron figures placed on Crosby Beach, angled so they are facing out to sea. This particular 2013 etching depicts a figure overlaid with grey, horizontal lines that echo the waves on a beach, and it was sold by Bonhams in February 2021 for £4,800.
“Another Place” Sold by Christies in 2021
