Penny Byrne: Armed and vulnerable

Hurt Locker, the two-metre glass and steel sculpture by Australian artist Penny Byrne, has come home. In 2015 the Berengo foundation and studio at Murano and the Hermitage Museum in Saint Petersburg invited Byrne, along with many international artists, to create a contemporary work exploring Gothic style for 'Glasstress', a regular collateral exhibition of the Venice Biennale. Responding to this curatorial theme, Byrne was inspired to produce Hurt Locker, a meditation on the concept of armour, protection and, ultimately, vulnerability.