“My Utopia” (quote from a paper written in about 1959)

I was about 12 years old.

“I will work towards my utopia or my ambition.  I want to be the most famous artist of the twentieth century.  Now that may sound like some stage struck kid but I am serious. The idea of becoming a run of the mill commercial artist haunts me.  I would rather not be an artist than be lost in the crowd.  Now, I don’t mean that I want to be another Rembrandt or Michaelangelo, but rather, something along the Norman Rockwell line. I love art and if they offered it six periods a day and you could still graduate, I would take all six. My Utopia is my ambition and my ambition is my art.”

None of these works are great stuff but they are images that have returned in new ways to me over the years. For the “Snowman” See “Blow Bunny” 1995 under bronzes, and “Victory and Defeat” 1996 under cast iron; For the ceramic head see “Pop” 1985 paper works or “Father” 2002 under $1 bill works; and for another portrait of my brother Joe Ed see “Fit to Kill” 1970’s Ceramics