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Considering the Shape of Things: the Fine Art of Sculpture

Florida sculpture artists

Considering the Shape of Things: the Fine Art of Sculpture and Florida Sculpture Artists

The fine arts encompasses a great variety of artistic styles and methods. From painting and drawing to photography and filmmaking to pottery and sculpture, the fine arts include creative expressions that will appeal to a broad range of people. Sculpture is an extremely popular style of fine art throughout the world.

Over the centuries, sculptures have developed from basic carved figurines of ancient times to more detailed, modern (and often considerably sized) forms of today. But what constitutes sculpture? Sculpture is a branch of the visual fine arts; it is one of the plastic arts, meaning art forms that involve modeling or molding. As explained in a 2019 article written by Katey Goodwin and Lydia Figes for ArtUK, “[s]culptural works include two-dimensional and three-dimensional, high-relief, low-relief, figurative or abstract, static or kinetic, and sometimes interactive” representative or abstract forms; they are usually carved from stone or wood, or cast in plaster or metal. Sculptures include everything from reliefs, monuments, and tombs, to busts, effigies, and carvings, to ceramics, found objects, assemblages, installations, and more.

“Where did I learn to understand sculpture? In the woods by looking at the trees, along roads by observing the formation of clouds, in the studio by studying the model….”

~Auguste Rodin

The first sculptural processes and materials were carving and modeling in stone, ceramics, wood and other materials. However, as time has passed, some processes have changed, new techniques have evolved, and a greater diversity of materials has developed.

Sculpture allows the design and creation of art objects from free-standing, self-supported pieces like statues to reliefs visually raised from a flat base or background. These pieces are created from a variety of media or materials; sculpture artists use clay, wax, stone, wood, plaster, metal, glass, found objects, etc. Sculptures are carved, modeled, molded, cast, welded, assembled, or otherwise shaped into two- or three-dimensional representations of an artist’s vision.

People have used sculpture to express their visions and ideas since prehistoric times. In the earliest of times, sculptures tended to realistically represent mythological and Biblical characters and events. More modern sculptures still are realistic in many instances, but there are more abstract sculptures now than ever. The variety within the field of the sculpture arts has grown a great deal over time, providing new and different artistic experiences of the world and the people in it.

The Naples Art District boasts the largest concentration of working artists in the Southwest Florida area. The unique coalition of over 70 fine artists based in the District, giving these professional creatives a place to share their talents, which range across a wide variety of mediums and methods. Many Floridian sculpture artists make their creative homes in the Naples Art District (NAD). If you are planning a trip to visit the Naples, Florida area and are interested in finding out more about NAD, contact the organization any time online or by phone at 239-249-1977. The NAD member artists, including sculpture artists Cori Craciun, Carolynn Desch, Sandy Mahler, Richard W. Rosen, Joel Shapses, and Linda SollarsNaples Art District, await your visit!