BEGINNINGS

So where and when does it start – the bug, the need, the seed?  Who knows how it happens for those not growing up in a family of artists as spear heads, guides, and teachers.  For some maybe it is that chance encounter at 5 or 6 years old with the high crucifix and Christ figure over your great uncle’s sick bed (Lupinacchi).  Something sets up deep inside you, then at the same age you visit your brother – now in military camp for WWII and there on a desk, in the medical office, you see a full casting of the whole upper denture plate – wow – amazing – I think the seed set and germination began.

Three dimensional became the way – spatial, became my way of life.  Piano studies with music filling the great void, the discus hurling out into space, cutting arcs, and the exciting myriad of forms possible with sculpture – the nooks, the crannies, the planes, the valleys – light, shadow, large, small, in the round or relief – what excitement to be able to learn, to create, to interpret life – to seize the moment – seize the day.

To make solid, to make permanent, for ‘all time” in sculpture, the transcendent forms of life.

So began a life’s journey…

That journey has touched many bases – many disciplines in the arts – honing up various skills for hand, eye, and the mind.  Enabling me to develop and execute works in sculpture from miniature to monumental and numerous projects and murals in the decorative arts. Translating the living form successfully and aesthetically into a solid material – clay, wood, bronze, marble, etc. requires not only knowledge and skill, but it requires principals of design and composition, of the dynamics of light, tone, value, pattern and color.

Aside from actually applying paint to a sculpture, the modeling, surface treatment, texture and dynamics of the design create pattern of color/tone – without which the work may not be successful.

The evolution of an original sculpture model from maquette to final life-size or greater scale should and must gather aesthetic refinement at each stage.  Not become just an enlargement of possibly a faulty design.  Too many works of inferior quality are produced (because the money is there).  They just become statues not sculptures.

Consider lettering – proper negative space between letters is essential.  Remove all punctuation from writing and you have – confusion.

In music – pull out all the rests, the tempo changes and consider the result.  A successful work of sculpture equally demands attention to these details.

All of this is not to say that my works are perfect, but I try to adhere to the principals of design.  Always looking – always checking, always refining.  Until all aspects, all views, read successfully with out conflict -- directing the viewer, sustaining the interest, conveying the message.