Rock Drill (Jacob Epstein) Rock Drill (Jacob Epstein) Rock Drill (c. 1913–1915) and the associated Torso in Metal from Rock Drill (c. 1913–1916) are Jacob Epstein's most radical sculptures. "Rock Drill" comprises a plaster figure perched on top of an actual rock drill. The combination of an industrial rock drill and the carved plaster figure makes the artwork an example of a "Readymade" created at the same time as Marcel Duchamp's "Bicycle Wheel" (1913). A 1974 reconstruction, by Ken Cook and Ann Christopher, is part of the Birmingham Museum and Art Gallery's collection. "Rock Drill" has been heralded as embodying the spirit of "radical
Jacob Epstein the smaller of the two figures represented on "Day". But the controversy affected his commissions for public work which dried up until World War II. Between the late 1930s and the mid-1950s, numerous works by Epstein were exhibited in Blackpool. "Adam", "Consummatum Est", "Jacob and the Angel and Genesis", and other works, were initially displayed in an old drapery shop surrounded by red velvet curtains. The crowds were ushered in at the cost of a shilling by a barker on the street. After a small tour of American fun fairs, the works were returned to Blackpool and were exhibited in