Fernando Botero was awarded the Lifetime Achievement Award from the International Sculpture Center in 2012. For a full list of Lifetime Achievement Award recipients, click here. Popular recognizability is Fernando Botero’s worst enemy, feeding the rejection of his work by many elitists who favor the age’s paradoxical taste for the smugly obscure combined with the profoundly superficial.
Syncretic Improvisations: A Conversation with Sanford Biggers
While working in Japan, Italy, Germany, Poland, Brazil, and the United States, Sanford Biggers honed his view that art may simultaneously embrace diverse cultures. For example, he sees the tree as a symbol of growth and connectedness to earth, as the natural form under which Buddha found enlightenment, and as slavery’s lynching post.
Sophie Ryder’s Creatures of Determination and Dexterity
There is little doubt that 20th- and 21st-century British sculpture has been one of the defining forces of contemporary art. From public enthusiasm for Henry Moore and Barbara Hepworth to current fascination with today’s illuminating figures, a tradition has persisted nearly without interruption.
William King’s Etruscan Days
William King is a keen observer of human experience. His sculptures can be amusing or acerbic, combining wit and satire in a choreography of social affectations and gestures. Recently King has been working with fabrics such as Naugahyde, burlap, and vinyl, which he fashions loosely, sews together, and attaches to metal armatures.
2012 Outstanding Student Achievement In Contemporary Sculpture Awards
The International Sculpture Center is proud to present the winners of the 2012 Outstanding Student Achievement in Contemporary Sculpture Awards. This year’s program attracted a large number of nominees from university sculpture programs in North America and abroad.
Fragile Balances: A Conversation with Sarah Sze
Joyce Beckenstein: When Sculpture published a previous interview with you in 2003, your work was very different. In broad strokes, how would you characterize the changes? Sarah Sze: I came to art with more training in architecture and painting.
Etsuko Ichikawa: Fire and Water
Following what may be described as a coming-out event at Miami’s Art Basel in 2005, Seattle artist Etsuko Ichikawa has had a series of impressive solo exhibitions around the United States, capped in 2011 by two extensive shows, one at the University of Wyoming’s Museum of Art and the second at Seattle’s Davidson Gallery.
Yayoi Kusama: Social Transformation Through Infinite Multiplication
Entering Yayoi Kusama’s Infinity Mirrored Room—Filled with the Brilliance of Life (2011), as staged at Tate Modern, you found yourself in a darkened, boxed space filled with colorfully flashing, suspended lights. The walls were lined with mirrors and the floor filled with water.
Constance DeJong: Beauty, Bare
There is no escaping the impact of a fully realized and meticulously executed sculpture by leading New Mexico artist Constance DeJong. Her quintessential black pieces, which she calls her “Four/Three Series,” evoke what might be called a shudder.
John Ruppert: Staging Energy
Back in 1992, John Ruppert was cleaning out his studio and rolling up some chain-link fencing when it got away from him. When he caught it, the loose end fanned out into space. All of a sudden, he realized that this loosely woven material had a structure, and he became interested in its mobilization of
