Francis Upritchard: Believer

Christchurch-trained and now London-based, Francis Upritchard has achieved international renown for her brightly coloured sculptures of gurus, idealists and dreamers. She offers two views of a so-called 'believer', complete with gown, string hair-band, and face paint, who seems to be 'transitioning' from meditation to some possible state of enlightenment. Upritchard was thinking, she says, 'about yoga, about spiritual beliefs and about people's attempts to free themselves from unhappiness.' While immersed in his beliefs, her figure also looks removed from the world – lost to us. His seems to be a faith with just one follower. This believer is a one-man religion.