When I visit Olivia Bax on a chilly but sunny Friday afternoon in her London studio, she has barely had time to catch her breath: teaching in Cheltenham, at the University of Gloucestershire, on two consecutive days, then getting the train to Sheffield to attend the opening of These Mad Hybrids, the exhibition she curated at the Millennium Galleries of Sheffield, then back to London and her studio. Busy is a natural state for Bax: last year alone, she had four solo exhibitions, in the middle of which was the opening of the first manifestation of These Mad Hybrids at the Royal West of England Academy (RWA). I ask her how it felt, seeing the exhibition come together for a second time in a different space.

It was really humbling,” she replies. “The show looked excellent at the RWA, in a traditional room with classical architecture. The Millenium Galleries in Sheffield presented the exact opposite – a 1990s construction, just one big white room with a grey floor. It was interesting to see how well the sculptures could adapt to a completely different architecture. I was having a conversation this morning with John Summers, one of the artists, and he said walking into the Millennium Galleries it’s like the first time you see or smell something – the works have this raw, primitive quality.”

Read the interview on Studio International