The Work

Richard's work as a sculptor has taken curious paths:  serious study (history, philosophy, theoretical physics, and cosmology) interrupted by episodes of blue water sailing, and a long period spent building and repairing wooden boats.

Recently I asked him where those paths had ultimately led.

"Nowhere," he laughed. "Like all such paths, they led back to where I began, back to myself, always returning me to my primary fascination, which is with line and form, and with that elusive quality that makes things beautiful.

"That's not to say they weren't useful," he went on; "you can't pursue such things without altering what you know yourself to be; reality becomes more fluid, and somewhat malleable."

"And the boatbuilding?"

"That was perhaps the essential part of my development; tha was where I developed the skills required to fabricate the complex sculptures I make."

Richard's work is an inquiry into the question: What is beauty? Really? Is it only in the eye of the beholder? Or is there an absolute beauty, a natural law that invariably shapes what our mind's eye sees, and shapes our respone to it as well?

He has found no definitive answers; perhaps there are none; perhaps there are only questions. But the work goes on, inspired by the quest, satisfied to explore and to express the beauty found in the structure of the world around him.

He no longer does metal shaping and fabrication in the United States. He has been living in Mexico for many years now, and pursues bronze casting and welded wire sculpture in his studio and foundry there.

The Sculpture