The present work, a collaborative scene from Richard Deacon and Thomas Schütte’s Them and Us exhibition at Lisson Gallery in 1995, transports the viewer into the fantastical and dramatic realm of Deacon and Schütte’s artistic self-reflection. Whilst planning the show, the duo became engaged in extensive discourse concerning 'scale, monuments, man and animal, man and man, man and light, space and colour and so on…' (Thomas Schütte, quoted in Matthias Winzen, ed., Siemens Kulturprogramm, Ostfildern, 1997, p. 111). Twelve mythical scenes emerged from the artists’ imagination with Schütte’s rudimentary and mysterious spirits interacting with Deacon’s animal hair sculptures. Investigating the connection between man and his surroundings, each of Schütte’s seemingly emotionless yet active figurines is left deliberately paired with Deacon’s tactile sculptures. Both figures, each with undeveloped physiognomy and spherical form, reveal themselves as the intricate workings of the artist’s hand. Explicitly forging boundaries through the divisive title Them and Us, the artists bring the perception of the relationship to the fore with the figures always relating 'to their surroundings, to the space, to the viewer, to each other' (Thomas Schütte, quoted in Matthias Winzen, ed., Siemens Kulturprogramm, Ostfildern, 1997, p. 111). Them and Us (X) studies the relationship between individuals and objects whilst simultaneously revealing the workings of Deacon and Schütte’s artistic introspection.