Dorothy Cross, Foxglove, 2024 | Frieze Masters 2025

Studio: Dorothy Cross |
15–19 October Stand C12

Work in progress
'It seems as if my studio exists outside its four walls. The building looks out at the Atlantic Ocean on the West coast of Ireland. Several islands stretch to the horizon, emerging and merging through the weather. The space functions as a filter, gathering elements and snagging ideas.

The studio is not a nine-to-five space. It is part of my home.'

- Dorothy Cross
Foxglove, 2024
€ 70,000

This work is from a series of bronze casts that Dorothy Cross has been developing since 2003, it is the largest of these to date. The creation of the Foxgloves is difficult and precarious. The flowers are extremely fragile and as part of their casting process each must first be dipped in wax and encased in plaster, prior to being burnt out by molten bronze as it is poured into the moulds. This method means the cast is in fact unique, and despite the monumentality normally associated with bronze, each carries within it an inherent fragility.

As context, Cross tells the story of how when she was a child, ‘we were told never to place our fingers in a foxglove and then lick them or we would go blind.’ In reality, rather than causing blindness, a group of medicines called digitalin can be extracted from foxgloves to be used as treatments for heart conditions. If one ingests too many digitalin however, vision can become distorted to make one see only in blue and white, an idea that continues to fasciate Cross. Looking closely at the work one can see that some of the foxglove’s flowers have actually been replaced by bronze casts of fingertips.

Foxglove was recently exhibited at Chatsworth House in The Gorgeous Nothings: Flowers at Chatsworth.
All prices exclude applicable duties and taxes.
NEWS

News
In Conversation | The Hellenic Centre
Thursday 13 November, 7–8pm 13 Nov 2025
Dorothy Cross will be in conversation with curator Iwona Blazwick about her work, discussing how her forms and images resonate with myth and metamorphosis.

The talk will be followed by a Q&A and a drinks reception. Please note this is a ticketed event.
Folkestone Triennial 2025
19 July–19 October 2025
Dorothy Cross is among the 18 artists chosen to participate in the sixth edition of Folkestone Triennial. From large-scale sculpture and sound installation to digital works and community collaborations, the 2025 commissions explore the layers of land and life beneath our feet.

The 2025 edition features new commissions by:

Céline Condorelli, Monster Chetwynd, Dineo Seshee Bopape, Cooking Sections, Dorothy Cross, John Gerrard, J Maizlish Mole, Rubiane Maia, Emeka Ogboh, Prabhakar Pachpute, Katie Paterson, Laure Prouvost, Emilija Škarnulytė, Rae-Yen Song, Jennifer Tee, Sara Trillo, Hanna Tuulikki and Sarah Wood.
Kinship At University College Cork, Ireland

Dorothy Cross, in partnership with University College Cork (UCC), is delighted to announce her project Kinship, which centres on the return of an Egyptian sarcophagus containing the mummified body of a man, which arrived in Ireland in 1914. It was given to University College Cork where it has been stored for over a century. Cross has worked alongside UCC for nearly three years, to secure the return of the mummy and sarcophagus to the Museum of Egyptology in Cairo.

Kinship is the ritualized journey of the mummy back to Egypt – his place of origin. The carrying of the body home is an act of return, almost an act of nature. It is a journey of respect, heavily symbolic and relevant today when millions of people on the planet are displaced and homeless. Like the Tomb of the Unknown Soldier the body represents all of us. Not just the return, Kinship incorporated the ripples of documentation that come from this historic event, taking the form of a feature length documentary, a visual art book and a large audio element. Hymns and ballads to life and death resonated across the project as the sarcophagus journeyed home.

Kinship followed on from Cross’ 2019 work, Heartship, both made in partnership with Mary Hickson andSounds from A Safe Harbour Festival.

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Dorothy Cross, Foxglove, 2024 | Frieze Masters 2025

NEWS

In Conversation | The Hellenic Centre

Folkestone Triennial 2025

Kinship At University College Cork, Ireland

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