Auckland based artist Chris Moore had a passion for blacksmithing from an early age, and has spent decades honing this into a successful career in sculpture. He built his experience in blacksmithing shops in the UK, completing work for the Royal Family at Buckingham Palace.

He is also experienced in bronze casting, which he has spent time in Europe before setting up his won workshop on the end of the Waitakere forest. His work can be found in a number of public commissions in Auckland, as well as in collections around New Zealand.

Much of Chris’ large scale sculptural works find their form as enlarged and abstracted elements of nature. This allows the metals to take on an unexpected lightness that he renders through the intensive process of forging, heating and shaping. In Branch (2023), a sweeping branch rises upwards to the light, galvanised with textures that reference a native forest frond.

His treatment of the sculptural surface of his works is extraordinarily painterly, which is what gives his pieces a signature characteristic. In his Bloom (2023), flowering ends are painted yellow, and in Cluster (2024) an alluring copper patina blue drips off the surface like paint.

Whether it is a forest or a wreath that Chris is forging, his work will leave you awestruck with its ability to capture and enlarge the delicacies of our natural environment through hard materials.