Artist Whiteread focuses on what is on the inside

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LONDON, England (CNN) -- To most people, the area underneath a chair or table or even the inside of a closet might be just empty space, but for artist Rachel Whiteread, it is what she has built her entire career on.

The British sculptor made her first work in 1988. Called "Closet," it was cast from the inside of a wardrobe.

"The way I made this was essentially the way I make all my work: getting an object and filling it will plaster and taking the object away. It's become much more complicated than that, but it was the very first thing that I did," Whiteread told CNN.

From "Closet," she has gone on to cast the inside of a huge variety of every day objects, including hot water bottles, book cases and even colostomy bags.

One of her most famous -- and ambitious -- pieces of work is "House," the cast of the interior of an entire Victorian terraced property in London, which in 1993 won her the highly sought-after British Turner Prize for contemporary art, making her the first woman to claim it.

The award was hugely controversial, earning her both international acclaim and criticism. Without a doubt, though, the win boosted her profile and her value -- her works can now sell for hundreds of thousands of dollars.

Born in London in 1963, Whiteread spent her early years growing up in and around London.

Whiteread is fascinated by abandoned objects, which she collects from the street, junkshops and even eBay. Many of the subjects of her work were found in London's second hand shops.

Her father, a geography teacher turned polytechnic administrator, died in 1989 while Whiteread was at art school. Her mother, Pat, was also an artist and died suddenly in 2003 age 72. Whiteread has said both her parents' deaths had a profound impact on her work.

Whiteread's work began attracting attention in the art world when it appeared at London's Saatchi Gallery in an exhibition called "Young British Artists 1" in 1992 alongside works by well-known names Tracey Emin and Damien Hirst.

In 1997, her works appeared in the art collector Charles Saatchi's private collection show "Sensation" at the Royal Academy.

Though always labeled a Young British Artist (YBA), unlike Emin and Hirst, Whiteread has never courted publicity and did not go to Goldsmiths College in London.

She remains intensely private and says she finds exhibition openings and press appearances difficult.

Whiteread's inaugural exhibition in Italy is to run at the MADRE art gallery in Naples until May 2007.

The retrospective includes several of her early works, as well as "Village," which was especially commissioned for the exhibition. The piece is made up of old dolls' houses, which are individually lit up.

Whiteread now lives and works in a former synagogue in East London with her partner Marcus Taylor, also a sculptor, and their two sons.

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