SARAH MAYHEW finds something vaguely familiar about an exhibition of large sculptural works at The North Wall.

I was immediately overcome by a sense of familiarity.

“I know that work from somewhere, but where?” I thought as I walked through the door of The North Wall arts centre in North Parade, Summertown, and was greeted by Suzanne O’Driscoll’s large-scale sculptural works.

It had emerged out of nowhere and quickly taken root, like a determined weed, at some point last year I am told, clinging, brazenly on to the side of an exterior wall of a housing development in Oxford.

That’s it! The six-metre synthetic structure gleaming at the road below, the brutal strength of nature holding effortlessly, tight on to the wall beside the ring road, I can picture it, but I can’t quite place it.

Hung against the clean lines and uninterrupted space of an art gallery O’Driscoll’s work takes on quite a different feel, less brutal, more playful and organic, perhaps due to the revelation of the process behind O’Drisoll’s work; O’Driscoll goes to great lengths to research her subject, collecting and recording images from the natural world, she goes on to make observational drawings and preparatory designs, some of which are exhibited alongside the finished works in her exhibition at The North Wall.

Progressing from her works on paper, O’Driscoll works alongside metal fabricators using the latest laser cutting technology to transform 2D drawings into 3D structures.

These metallic shapes glinted at me under the gallery’s light, as the layers of seemingly untreated metal gave depth to the organic scenes.

Though, somehow, more visually arresting are O’Driscoll’s matt, coloured sculptures.

While appearing more flat and 2D, they possess the energy and immediacy of Pop Art as they transform common plant forms into replicable, yet glamorous objects of desire.

Most sophisticated, and most attractive to my eye are O’Driscoll’s monotone works, where the light play and shadows dance most delicately across the taut, tough structures revealing the subtle nuances of the material, and emphasising the intricate strength of nature at it’s most beautiful.

This oxymoronic relationship between strength and delicacy is displayed perfectly in the careful curating where a red sculpture is positioned on a plinth that sits in front of green, rust, and silver wall-hung sculptures, and causes the viewers gaze to bounce between the works as one would taking a stroll through a richly choreographed botanical garden.

Indeed, the motif of a Gretian urn reappears within O’Driscoll’s work, and the tropical shapes of the flora all allude to a lust for exploration and travel. I am told that O’Driscoll has won major prizes to travel in Central America and Italy, and takes inspiration from her time abroad feeding it back into her creative practice.

O’Dricoll’s oeuvre is delightfully accessible, celebrating nature, travel and man’s lust for life.

New Sculptural Work by Suzanne O’Driscoll is an enjoyable exhibition, and I imagine that her work could easily become an enjoyable addition to an area of almost any environment; it’s not intrusive, but it’s memorable, hanging in there, reminding the viewer that life’s pretty good, and worth colouring in with unashamedly bright washes of prime colour… as you sit in a traffic jam on the Oxford ring road.

* New Sculptural Work by Suzanne O’Driscoll continues until Saturday, October 30, at The North Wall, South Parade, Oxford. The gallery is open Monday to Saturday, 11am-4pm and admission is free Call 01865 319450 for details or visit thenorthwall.com and suzanneodriscoll.com