West Rutland, Vermont
The Carving Studio and Sculpture Center
The Carving Studio and Sculpture Center Industry and art make for fascinating bedfellows. “Historical Markers,” part of SculptFest 2013, was installed at the Carving Studio and Sculpture Center, a model repurposing of a post-industrial facility as an art park and working sculpture studio. The land has been quarried since the 1830s, and the Gawet Marble Company still uses a portion of the 170-acre site. Curator Phil Whitman, who remembers his early childhood experiences of historical sites, used that sense of living history as an inspiration for his exhibition. Working amid relics collected over the course of 180 years, nine participating sculptors produced works that complemented the site in daring and exquisite ways. Ashley Goodwin’s The Immortal, like a contemporary Sisyphus, bowed under his burden of a hand-hewn marble block. Goodwin designed the quarryman’s body in unfired clay laid over a wood and steel armature with the express intent that the clay would crack and decompose, leaving the skeleton to sustain the stone. ..…see the entire review in the print version of November’s Sculpture magazine.
