Sculpture is an artistic form in which hard or plastic materials are worked into three-dimensional art objects.  The designs may be embodied in freestanding objects, in reliefs on surfaces, or in environments that envelop the spectator. An enormous variety of media may be used, including clay, wax, stone, metal, fabric, glass, wood, plaster, rubber and even found objects.   Material may be carved, modeled, molded, cast, wrought, welded, sewn, assembled, or otherwise shaped and combined.  Sculpture is not a fixed term that applies to a permanently circumscribed category of objects or sets of activities.  It is, rather, the name of an art that grows and changes and is continually extending the range of its activities and evolving new kinds of objects.  

Certain features, which in previous centuries were considered essential to the art of sculpture, no longer form part of its modern definition.  One of the most important of these features is representation.  Before the 20th century, most sculpture was considered a representational art, one that imitated forms in life, most often the human figures but also inanimate objects, such as game, utensils, and books.  Since the turn of the 20th century sculpture has also included nonrepresentational forms, but it really wasn't until later in the century that nonfunctional, nonrepresentational, three-dimensional works of art began to be produced.

A sculpture may draw upon what already exists in the endless variety of natural and man-made form, or it may be a creation of pure invention.  It has been used to express a vast range of human emotion and feeling from the most tender and delicate to the most violent and ecstatic.

All human beings, intimately involved from birth with the world of three-dimensional form, learn something of its structural and expressive properties and develop emotional responses to them.  This combination of understanding and sensitive response, often called a sense of form, can be cultivated and refined.  It is to this sense of form that the art of sculpture primarily appeals.

But I for one am mainly interested in representational sculpture...specifically figurative sculpture.  I am fascinated and moved by the figure, as in fact almost all human beings are in one way or another.  That is not to say that I can't be moved by abstraction….I can.  But it is a rare talent that can really speak in this language we call abstraction and unfortunately, I find that most practitioners of this style of art are simply failed figurative artists who feel that anyone can make abstraction……how wrong they are. For me, either you have that ability or you don't…most do not.  

However, what I find most perplexing is how few collectors seem to think about sculpture when they look for art.  They will consider paintings, drawings and even prints, but seem to shy away, if not completely ignore sculpture.  I don't think its that they don't like it, everyone stops and looks at sculputes in parks, museums or adorning prominent buildings.  But ask them if they collect sculpture and they will most often say no.  I believe that most people are a bit intimidated by sculpure.  How will they display it at home?  Do they need special niches or pedestals?  What about caring for sculpture....how do you do that?  Yet every collector that I've helped to begin the journey towards  owning sculpture finds the experience highly rewarding and fulfilling.  I can't tell you how wonderful it is to posses these three-dimensional objects.  Don't get me wrong, I love the two-demensional works I own, and treasure them every day, but I seem to have a different relationship with my sculpture.....its almost as if its alive.  I can touch them, feel the coolness of the bronze or stone against my fingers, and even move them around with me so that are near me where I sleep, or sit or read.  They are a very personal kind of object that I take whereever I spend any significant time.  If you don't already own some sculpture, you are truly missing out on a great collecting adventure.  

Much as I hate selfies, couldn't resist one with this creation by my favorite sculptor....Rodin (Metropolitan Museum)  

Garcia & Co.

fine art consulting group