Tonto Sculpture

I was born in Marion Ohio to an Air Force family and spent much of my youth moving around the country about every two year. I ended up in California where I started studying art. After exploring various forms of art and moving to Arizona I started on a new art path by sculpting stone and combining it with bronze. This has been the most difficult artwork I've done. Working with 30, 100, 500 pounds stones that are almost as hard as diamonds requires the use of diamond saws and tools. Sometimes I will have a stone in my studio for a month, turning it, handling it and looking at it from different angles, trying to see what is in the stone. How does the color in the stone run? What is the shape the stone will want to take? Then, after I decide on a shape I must decide what bronze will go with the stone. Will it be a man or women? Will it be passive or aggressive? Will the motion of the piece be in the stone or will the motion be in the bronze or in both? The last thing I must consider is that when turning the wax into bronze it will shrink about 7 percent. I have to make the wax so the finished bronze will still fit the stone. When I finish, I want my piece to draw you in and for you to feel what the subject is feeling. I want my buyers to be able to connect on an emotional level with their piece. If I am able to do this, I have accomplished what I set out to do.After moving to Goodyear, Arizona I started producing and selling art at local art shows. From that beginning I have expanded to participating in over 10 juried shows a year in California, Colorado, New Mexico, Texas, and Arizona. I was the featured artist at the Sonoran Art League’s Out West Art Festival, and the Premier Southwest Artists’ Casa Grande Art Festival, the Sedona Fine Art Festival, and the Thunderbird Fine Art and Wine shows. My work has received first place, second place and honorable mention awards. My art has been in the following galleries: Navaro Gallery, Sedona, AZ Mountain Spirits, Prescott, AZ Gray Leaf Gallery, Prescott, AZ The Gallery at the Four Seasons Resort, Scottsdale, AZ The Gallery at the Boulders, Carefree, AZ Rogoway’s Gallery Turquoise Tortoise , Tubac, AZ Canyon Road Gallery, Santa Fe, AZ Wind Rush Gallery, Sedona, AZ Arroyo Gallery, Santa Fe, NM ( I am currently not in any galleries. The problem is that because I do one of a kind sculptures I can not make enough to do shows and be in galleries.)