Ahuva Zeloof didn’t start sculpting until her fifties—but when she did, she carved out an artistic voice that’s as bold as it is tender. Her latest body of work, FAITH, blends spirituality with raw natural material, creating tactile narratives shaped by motherhood, memory, and meditation. Having exhibited alongside icons like Tracey Emin and David Hockney, she now releases her debut book FAITH chronicling the journey. We caught up with Ahuva Zeloof to talk about sculpture, stone, and why it’s never too late to create.
Your journey into sculpture began later in life. How did stepping into creativity after raising your family shape your artistic voice?
I always had an artistic side to me, but I initially didn’t have the time to explore it properly, as I was raising four children. Before I began sculpting, I never would’ve expected that I could do this fulltime and find a new life through it. My family still takes up time, but it’s the art that captures my life now. Most of my pieces are faces, women, bodies, and that is definitely coloured by my experience as a mother and grandmother – I always say the female body is the most incredible machine to ever exist!
When you look at my pieces, you can see their expressions. What do they say when the eyes are closed? When they’re open? When you’re surrounded by your kids and your family, all these elements are an expression of life.
FAITH marks a real turning point in your practice. What inspired you to focus more on spiritual expression than physical manipulation in these works?
Even when I was busy with other things, I wanted to explore the possibilities of stone and glass and bronze in different ways. I never want to be monotonous. The project that became FAITH was in the back of my mind for many years, and it kept growing and growing. When it happened suddenly, it was like magic. It just flourished in my thoughts and brain and hands. All these years I was collecting ideas, putting them to the side for the day when it would happen. I don’t think the world was ready for my thoughts—I don’t think even I was ready, but after a point I realised the time was right.
Although I am not chiselling stone or modelling figures in the same way as I did in my previous series’, my work as an artist comes through the imagining and directing of the ‘scenes’ or tableaux that the stones create when brought together.
The fact that this idea developed from within is the reason I think it’s so spiritual. Everyone has their own faith, but faith is vast. Everyone has their own way of expressing their faith. So, like faith itself, the project is open for everyone to interpret in their own way. I just hope people feel a sense of spirit when they see it or touch it.
You describe your pieces as “created by nature and found by the artist.” How did working with natural stone shift your approach to form and storytelling?
During COVID, I was in the garden, where I suddenly noticed a stone. It was fractured and scratched, and somehow this texture seemed suited to the time we were in. That birthed a whole series, mainly large-scale heads, that were imperfect in some way. The natural surface of the stones was integral to the story I was telling here, about the difficult time we were living through, and about the expectation to look flawless. The stones themselves were the inspiration.
Sometimes I’m surprised that people pass by, ignoring the world around, they see these stones and they don’t talk to them. I’ve made it a habit of collecting stone and pebbles.
That process of conversation with these raw materials – which of course are created by nature – is where my sculpting begins. When I pick up a stone, I try to understand what it has to share. I’ve never drawn something. Not on the stone, and not on a paper. I’ve just chiselled, and things happened. I want to explore what I can do, what I can portray to people, and how I can make them feel what I felt the first time I picked up that stone.
This artistic philosophy overall has led me to experiment with different mediums, not just stones, selecting objects that allow you to see something new in them every time you pass by.
The book divides into the making of FAITH and the final sculptures. How important was it for you to reveal the process, not just the finished pieces?
It always starts with the stones, but from there I began thinking more adventurously about how to put everything together for a book.
The small pieces I first created made me think about how a solitary person can pray on their own, and how the whole world doesn’t exist in those moments of meditation. I had that vision in mind.
I knew that I wanted to showcase this process and these associations in creating my pieces and to let people see where they’ve come from, since that brings so much added value. Making the book itself is hard to describe, since I’ve never done anything similar, but it was an amazing experience. In this world of AI, a book is a beautiful thing, and now I can better appreciate the work that goes into them and the solidity it brings to a project.
Texture and the question of “completion” are central to your work. How do you decide when a sculpture feels truly finished—or is it more about letting go?
The truth is: you can always overdo it! Once a piece is on the go, it seems to ask questions: what is it trying to say? What is it portraying? What is the message, and what can you see? My sculptures, whether they’re stone or glass, are tactile. You want to touch them. You want to feel the surface. The touch, the rough and the smooth, is very important. But there is a balance for sure. It all comes through hard work, but the process is like a dream. I just have to wake up at the right point and put down the tools.
You’ve exhibited alongside greats like Tracey Emin and David Hockney. How has sharing space with such iconic names influenced your own creative evolution?
Never in my wildest dreams would I have believed I’d be sharing a space with people of their calibre. I have a huge appreciation for the galleries that first accepted my pieces when I was an unknown artist, this gave me a lot of confidence that I could create my own art, and it gave me the drive to persevere.
Your Shoreditch studio has been a part of your story for years. How has the energy of East London helped nurture your art over time?
The East End is in my blood. That’s where we started and we’re still here. My family came to London in the 1970s, straight to the East End! It was different back then, mostly trade and much less artistic. But there was something in the air, in the concrete itself: I felt the life in the bridges, the warehouses, the pavement, and the cobbled streets. It was wonderful. And there was a vision of what it could be already forming, I feel honoured to have watched it change over the last fifty years.
What would you say to anyone who feels it’s “too late” to embark on an artistic journey or embrace a new passion?
In one sentence: it’s never too late. You can always try. If it doesn’t happen, try again. You’re not losing anything. You’re trying. Every hurdle is an experience. Every failure strengthens you. If your mind is hooked on an idea, you’ll get there, slow or fast. It doesn’t matter exactly how it happens, just don’t give up.
