Artwork-Artist Statements

Bio Temples II
Viewers are sometimes curious as to how a work of art is created. Included in the exhibition were photographs showing the process of acquiring marble at its source in the Rocky Mountains. Sculptors from all over the world come to a remote location where temporary tent studios are set up each summer. Living outdoors next to the stone, the sculptors carve down the boulders of white crystalline marble before hauling the stone out amid hairpin curves on narrow mountain roads. Returning to his studios in New Mexico and Virginia, Delano refines his work through drawing and anatomical studies. Photos of this process, allowing the viewer to see the sculptor at work, add an appreciation for the transformation from stone to sculpture.

Bio Temples exhibition from September 10 through October 28, 2011 featured sculptures and drawings that are inspired by the “body temple”, where spirit and matter coexist. Rick Delano also sees this sacred union extended into nature, where energy and physical form interplay. Delano expresses this through anatomical and biomorphic forms, often combining geometric abstraction with organic figurative shapes.

Rick Delano doesn’t see the marble as a cold, hard stone. He knows it has a skin, a flowing grain, and crystalline structure that captures light and warms the marble. In fact, because the marble is made of densely packed crystals, the stone is literally able to glow when a light enters it. “I’m interested in this inner light as a metaphor for transillumination,” explains Delano.

Rick Delano has a studio in rural Virginia and in the mountains of New Mexico. His studio in Virginia includes an outdoor carving area at the edge of thick woods. The filtered light and changing seasons lend a rhythm to his work. In his Ojo Caliente studio, the clear light and strong geological formations also inspire his art.

Rick Delano carves full-time, having quit a career as a Rehabilitation Engineer, designing adaptive equipment for severely deformed and handicapped clients. Finding elegant solutions through merging science and art has always been an interest of Delano’s. For example, the Spider Chair in the Children’s Museum of Richmond, was engineered by combining the tension of antique Chinese bridges with Gothic flying buttresses to create its eight-foot span. Likewise, in an architectural commission for a Chesapeake Bay patron, Heron, Delano utilized Egyptian relief carving techniques. Though metaphysical in intent, an anatomic precision, as well as references to fractals, can be seen in his work. You can view more of his work at: www.rickdelano.com