Based Upon, an artists’ studio based in London, creates customized pieces of contemporary art and design for clients around the world. Founded in 2004 by twin brothers Ian and Richard Abell, the organization has since grown into a thriving collective, with each artist bringing a unique eye and hand for craftsmanship.
While concentrating on emphatically personal works of sculptural furniture, Based Upon has also been commissioned for monumental public sculpture as well, including permanent installations in Hong Kong and London.
Like much of Based Upon’s work, the Fragmented Crack has been created at the intersection of art and design. The piece speaks to the original crack, as tectonic plates broke, collided and reformed to create new continents – birthing the diversity in life, lands and cultures of today. Each element of the piece is individually cast in bronze, and designed to fit perfectly with the others. When brought together, the sculpture is one complete form; disparate parts are reunited and reconciled; their different functions are unified.
Born of a process in which casts were made from cracked clay houses at the source of the White Nile, the piece was then developed in their London studio. At once precious and raw, the Fragmented Crack embodies the Based Upon vision of creative engagement with narrative and nature in art and fabrication.
'If I’d Known Then What I Know Now'' is a cast bronze map of India. The country’s outline appears torn from paper, a play on man’s willingness to draw and redefine national boundaries. The sculpture’s topography is decided in an act of creative surrender by discarding the paper and then reclaiming it to be scanned and cast in bronze.
