λ Hamish Mackie (British b. 1973) Caracal Head Bronze Signed, dated 2010 and numbered 2/2 to the underside Height: 27cm (10 5/8in.), Inc. base: 34cm (13 3/8in.) Provenance: Collier & Dobson, Fordingbridge, Hampshire Acquired from the above by the present owner 'You should be able to look wildlife sculpture in the eye and see life' (Hamish Mackie) Hamish Mackie (b.1973) is a considered one of the world's foremost wildlife sculptors. Largely self-taught, Mackie's subjects range from livestock to birds to wild animals, all observed in their natural environment. From the first impressionistic sketches and quick models in plasticine, Mackie works to build up a detailed and atomically accurate core covered with a vibrant skin which serves to capture each individual animal's personality. As with lots 174, 175 and 177 offered here, Mackie often works in bronze. Caracal Head, Leopard Turning in Tree and Sitting Leopard Head all demonstrate Mackie's ability to covey a spontaneous and instinctive moment of an animal's behaviour, from a leopard stretching out and relaxing in a tree to the caracal with his ears pricked up and eyes alert as though he may have just spotted potential prey. It is these intimate moments which Mackie so skilfully depicts which help to bring the sculptures to life. Mackie's love for animals developed at an early age when in 1978, aged five, he moved with his family to a farm in Lostwithiel, Cornwall and was often tasked with looking after the livestock. It was here that he made his first bronze sculpture - a calf's head, given to his father as a Christmas present and which still hangs in the kitchen today. After completing a course in design at Kingston University, Mackie travelled to Africa and in 1995, took a job on a hunting camp in Zimbabwe. It was here that he was able to observe the distinction between an animal in the wild and one in captivity. This interest led him to the conservationist organisation TUSK whom he still supports today. It was during his time in Africa that Mackie fell in love with African wildlife and produced his fist wax sculpture of a cheetah. On his return to the UK, Mackie worked with the sculptor Mark Coreth and began to cast his models in bronze for commercial sale. In 1997, Mackie was accepted into the Royal Academy's Summer Exhibition following on from his first solo show with Fanshawe Somerset, London. Several successful solo shows followed and in 2013 Mackie was commissioned to produce six horses galloping through Berkeley Group Holdings in Spitalfields, London. In 2016, Mackie was awarded the Public Monuments and Sculpture Association's (PMSA) annual Marsh Award for Excellence in Public Sculpture and Public Fountains.