A Weekend Carving Class, Taken to Keep a Friend Company, Made Amanda Sumpter a Stone Sculptor

Amanda Sumpter is a stone carver and painter in Fletching, East Sussex, who carves soft, tactile, organic forms by hand from alabaster, African serpentine, limestone and marble. Trained as a painter at Chelsea College of Art, she stepped back from exhibiting to raise a family; in 2004 a friend asked her to keep her company on a stonecarving taster weekend, and she was completely hooked.

Amanda is a direct carver, working by hand and letting the carving process guide the final form – she thinks of each carving as a drawing in three dimensions. Pieces can take months. Most of her stone comes from Southern Stone near Bournemouth, and reclaimed Welsh slate from monumental masons, once just a plinth, has become part of the sculpture itself. In 2026 a QEST scholarship took her to Pietrasanta, Italy, to train in marble carving.

Amanda takes commissions; the timescale depends on the scale of the piece. Her commissions so far have started in person, with a conversation at an open studio event, and she advises a studio visit to anyone considering one, to get an idea of the character of the stone, its scale and weight. She is open to working with interior and garden designers.

Amanda has sold more work at open studios than anywhere else – in the last three years, 25 small carvings, 13 larger carvings and 10 paintings. Instagram is her main channel today: buyers have bought directly through messages, galleries have invited her to show, and her representation by The Vanner Gallery in Salisbury came from a mutual follow.

Stonecarving was never on Amanda’s radar. Over the years she had explored ceramics, plastics and bookbinding. Then, in July 2004, a friend asked her to keep her company on a stonecarving weekend taster course at Skelton Workshops, taught by Paulien Gluckman and Helen Mary Skelton. The earliest piece she carved that weekend has lived in her bedroom ever since.

“Stonecarving was never on my radar until a friend asked me to keep her company on a stonecarving weekend taster course and that was it, I was completely hooked.”

Before that, she had trained as a painter. She entered Chelsea College of Art to complete an MA in painting but quickly became interested in sculpture, performance and installation, and had opportunities to exhibit in London and America. “What I really loved was being in the studio and figuring things out through making.” When her son was born in 1996, she stepped back from exhibiting to focus on raising a family, but drawing, painting and the need to make never left her.

Stone felt like a natural extension of her intuitive approach to drawing, with the added physicality of working directly with material. “I love the fact that stone isn’t passive. You can begin with an idea, but each piece of stone has its own character and surprises. You have to listen to it.” In 2024 she accepted redundancy retirement from her teaching role and returned to full-time studio practice – “the best decision I have ever made.” She calls herself a re-emerging artist.

Amanda has lived and worked in rural Sussex all her life, and the landscape shapes how she sees: natural shapes, soft curves and the way one form nestles against another. She is a direct carver working by hand, which lets what happens in the carving guide the final form. “There’s a lovely balance between being in control and having to surrender a little bit of control.”

Pieces can take months to complete. She wants forms that appear soft and fluid despite the hardness of the material, with folds and swellings suggesting an energy beneath the surface – pieces that invite touch. Her stone comes mostly from Southern Stone near Bournemouth; the African serpentine came from a woman in Brighton who used to teach Zimbabwean carving from her home, and the Welsh slate is reclaimed at Skelton Workshops. “Nothing is ever wasted.”

In September 2026 she spent three weeks in Pietrasanta, Italy, on a QEST scholarship, training under sculptor Kyle Ann Smith. The biggest surprise was how power tools could fit her way of working: rather than removing large chunks of stone, she learnt to use the cutting blade with great precision, gradually drawing into the surface. “It felt surprisingly close to my intuitive, hand-led approach to carving.”

The dust is part of the job. “People often have a romantic idea of being a stonecarver quietly chipping away in your sunlit studio. There is a bit of that but stone carving is hard physical work. There’s a lot of repetitive movement, a lot of dust, and sometimes you spend hours doing something that looks like you’ve achieved almost nothing.”

The Fragment Series is carved from the same piece of African serpentine; although each carving takes on its own identity, Amanda feels a particular dialogue between them – “a resting moment caught in stone as if they’ve paused mid conversation.” Still Listening belongs to her organic, almost seed-like forms, “thoughts that I can’t quite let go of.” In Held 03, the reclaimed Welsh slate she began using as a plinth became part of the sculpture: “The carving pushes into the slate, the slate pushes back and this creates a tension and a connection between the two.” Still Listening photo: Saltwick Media.

Amanda’s buyers are principally in the UK, and all her sales so far have been national. Her work is in private collections, in people’s houses and gardens. Besides sales at gallery shows and open studios, she is represented by The Vanner Gallery, which manages sales through the gallery. Her pieces range from £200 to £2,000.

Amanda started selling once she started actively showing her work – at open studio events to begin with, and later in curated gallery shows. She opens her own studio and home for Artwave each September, showing her work alongside guest artists, and shows as a guest artist at the Brighton Open Houses in May and SEOS in June. Every commission so far has started with a conversation at an open studio.

Open studios have brought the most sales: in all, 25 small carvings, 13 larger carvings and 10 paintings in the last three years. Instagram is her main channel today. Buyers have bought work directly through messages – she recently sold a painting and a carving that way – and galleries and other artists have invited her to show and work together after seeing her profile. “Instagram is a really useful tool for an artist.”

Her gallery representation came the same way: The Vanner Gallery in Salisbury found her through a mutual follow on Instagram and started representing her in 2026. She has sold two paintings through them so far, and her next show there, in June 2027, will showcase her carving.

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Balancing an art career with family life meant stepping away from exhibiting for many years. She kept making work, but returning to the art world and putting herself forward for opportunities again took confidence and perseverance.

Stone itself is unpredictable. A block of African serpentine is often made up of different material consistencies, and fault lines inevitably run through it. “A piece can fall apart when you least expect it so it can often be a case of expecting the worst but hoping for the best!” From one serpentine block she managed eleven small carvings, over three months. Working by hand also limits the scale and types of stone she can tackle – which is why she is now developing her skills to work more ambitiously.

Discovering stone carving in 2004 brought together her love of drawing, intuitive mark-making and working with materials. After her father died in 2012, memory, loss and the significance of objects became increasingly important in her work – “how materials and familiar forms can hold traces of people and experiences.” Returning to full-time studio practice in 2024 let her develop that work with renewed ambition. The same year she won the Art Gemini Prize for sculpture, and in 2026 the QEST scholarship took her to Pietrasanta.

Amanda wants to use her new skills to carve British marbles and alabasters: “There are so many beautiful native British stones that are under-represented in contemporary carving.” Held 03 is shown at The Discerning Eye Exhibition at the Mall Galleries in London on 13–21 November 2026, and another carving at Sussex Contemporary at the BN9 Studio in Newhaven on 7–29 November 2026. In summer 2027 she will again show at Stone 27, the biennial stonecarving exhibition at Falconhurst Estate.

“I’m a sculptor and painter drawn to the unexpected possibilities of making. Through slow, intuitive carving, I transform stone into soft, tactile, organic forms that feel familiar yet elusive. My work explores the hidden energy within materials and the subtle ways that memories, connections and moments of exchange shape our experience of the world.”

Who: Amanda Sumpter
What: Hand-carved stone sculpture in alabaster, African serpentine, limestone and marble; painting
Where: Fletching, East Sussex, England, UK
Started: July 2004
Audience: About 1,530 Instagram followers
Customers: 25 small carvings, 13 larger carvings and 10 paintings sold in the last three years
Price range: £200–£2,000
Custom orders: Yes – timescale depends on the scale of the piece
Ships: Within the UK so far
Works with designers: Open to interior and garden designers
Channels: Word of Mouth & Offline, Social Media