STUDENT CLOSE-UP

Sculpting Success

MU is one of only two universities to have two winners in the International Sculpture Center's 2007 competition.

By Nancy Moen

“The gift from graduate school is that you have the opportunity to take risks,” says art student Amanda Salov.

Salov and fellow graduate student Eric Carlson are enjoying the rewards of their risk-taking in the field of sculpture. Judges of the International Sculpture Center’s 2007 competition selected them for Outstanding Student Achievement in Contemporary Sculpture Awards.

Salov and Carlson are among 21 winners from 339 student nominees whose artwork will be on exhibit through April 27, 2008 at Grounds for Sculpture in Hamilton, N.J.

“It’s a real testament to the quality of the schools’ sculpture programs,” says Lauren Hallden-Abberton of the International Sculpture Center. More than 140 universities and art institutes nationally nominate their students for the annual awards.

Salov’s three pieces chosen for display are non-archival works, meaning they won’t last. She created them of translucent porcelain, boiled sugar and wax, with a touch of food coloring for the pastel hues. The abstract sculptures — “Dripping Sweetness,” “Gentle Anxiety” and “Tip-toe” — demonstrate how the human condition is fragile and in transition.

Salov boils the sugar to hard-crack stage for a liquid that resembles slow-moving molten glass. “I don’t think of candy as food,” she says of the thin, fragile coating. “It’s so luring, shiny and pretty, like a facade of energy.”

Salov understands that these creations are rather strange, but she says they also show a sensitivity she has had since childhood. “I’m not at a place now where I have to sell my work (although “Tip-toe” has sold),” she says.

After graduating with a master of fine arts degree in May, Salov began a summer residency as an assistant teacher of sculpture at Anderson Ranch Art Center, an artists’ conclave in Snowmass, Colo. She is now teaching and working as an artist in residence at the University of Arkansas-Fayetteville.

Carlson, who has the physique of a body builder and a secure psyche to match, seldom gets teased about working in fiber art. Yes, he sews with baby-soft fleece. So what?

Carlson stitched his way to the national award with a fiber collection of stuffed toy weapons: a gun rack with machine guns in various colors, land mines, green grenades, football-shaped mortar rockets, a dynamite pack complete with cord and plunger and a quarter-scale model of the bomb dropped on Hiroshima.

His exhibition piece, “Plays Well with Others,” is a 3-foot by 4-foot bear trap that functionally closes. The trap invites people to play with it while provoking them to think about the violence behind the art. Through the unusual sculpture series, Carlson makes fun of himself and his childhood fascination with violent action figures and movie stars.

“It’s meant to get people to see how we are seduced by violence and how it affects our culture,” he says.

Carlson grew up in a family of blue-collar workers. As he watched his mother sew and knit, he developed a fascination for crafts and fibers, which offended his father’s view of manliness — boys don’t need to sew.

“Every field I’m attracted to is a craft: metals, jewelry, ceramics and fibers,” Carlson says. “My grandfather showed me how to work with my hands and not be afraid of it.”

Carlson graduated with a master of fine arts degree in May 2007. He is teaching color theory and 3-D design at the University of Central Missouri in Warrensburg. He continues to create as well as teach.

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Last Update: November 15, 2007