The sculpture Nipper Long Reach represents an elaboration of a sculptural language audiences first had sight of in the Hydraulic Power Tool sculptures James Capper made for the group show Fabricators at Hannah Barry Gallery in 2010, and which he pursued again in a second display of work in this “Division” for the Armory Show in New York (2012). Nipper Long Reach established the founding elements of a substantial family of sculpture defined by its distinct double “jaw” drawn soon after in 2012. The titles and forms of more recent sculptures in this group shown in the exhibition Tools Of The Trade, also at Hannah Barry Gallery (2015), were inspired by the living world of reptiles, insects and birds. However considered in action their hydraulically controlled “teeth” – a term we now happily associate with James’ sculpture – demonstrate cutting and rapid fracturing capacities that seem entirely at the service of an industrial application.