Skip to main content
Want more images or videos?
Request additional images or videos from the seller
1 of 5

James Bearden
Brutalist Abstract Sculpture, Gilded Steel and Bronze James Bearden American Mod

About the Item

Wall-hanging sculpture: blackened steel, fused bronze, solvent dyes, abstract form, USA; Signed; 20 x 8 x 3 1/4 Suggesting archaeological artifacts from the future, these sculptures and functional pieces have been described as post-apocalyptic and brutalist in style, and they’re capturing the attention of collectors and galleries across the country. Bearden was born in Alabama but grew up in Des Moines and received bachelor’s degrees in fine art and visual communications from Grand View University. He worked in graphic design for 20 years, most of that time as an award-winning art director at Flynn Wright advertising agency. In 2007, at the age of 43, he decided to leave that job and focus on fine art. A longtime painter, Bearden found himself drawn to sculpture. The work of Pablo Picasso, Harry Bertoia, Alexander Calder and Louise Nevelson particularly inspired him. His early pieces were smooth, abstract shapes made from wire and sheets of steel painted with bright colors, evoking pop art. That felt like a dead end, he says, so he went in the opposite direction, building both organic and architectonic forms encrusted with craggy texture and charred, corroded or patinated finishes. In 2012 Bearden entered his first public art competition. His sculpture, Paths Unite, was accepted for Clive’s Art Along the Trail and then purchased for the city’s permanent collection. He also has outdoor sculptures at Blank Park Zoo and Lowe Art Center in Marion, as well as in Ames, Coralville and Plymouth, Minnesota. Rago auction brought Bearden’s sculptures to the attention of Larry Weinberg, owner of Weinberg Modern in New York. Weinberg began collecting Bearden’s work for himself and his gallery. This past winter, he curated a solo show of Bearden’s sculptures and functional pieces at 1stdibs Gallery in the New York Design Center. Weinberg compares Bearden’s style to the brutalist furniture of Paul Evans (1931-1987), a midcentury modern craftsman described as “the father of the modern art-furniture movement.” Brutalism as an architectural style emerged after World War II and was characterized by the use of rough concrete as the primary building material. The term has been revived in the past few years to apply to a raw, un-prettified approach to web design as well as to the 1960s-1970s interior design aesthetic that emphasized rugged textures, distressed metals, unfinished concrete and industrial materials. He went on to create cabinet-like boxes that he categorized as Dwelling Boxes, Harry Boxes (a tribute to the late sculptor and modern furniture designer Harry Bertoia), Barnacle Boxes and Nugget Boxes, which are gilded with 24-karat gold leaf. Although each piece is unique, Bearden organizes them into categories based on his approach to constructing them. The 24-karat gold leaf is the latest addition to his finishing options. “I taught myself how to do it,” he says. “It’s a more expensive and time-consuming process, but it has a totally different color,” one that can’t be imitated with paint. “It’s really beautiful.”
  • Creator:
    James Bearden (1964, American)
  • Dimensions:
    Height: 20 in (50.8 cm)Width: 8 in (20.32 cm)Depth: 3.25 in (8.26 cm)
  • Medium:
  • Period:
  • Condition:
  • Gallery Location:
    Surfside, FL
  • Reference Number:
    1stDibs: LU38211357592

More From This Seller

View All
Large Mario Almaguer Cuban Art Welded Painted Steel Abstract Sculpture Modernism
Located in Surfside, FL
Mario Almaguer (b. Marianao, Cuba, 1955) He moved to the U.S. in 1994 to Miami where since has been living and working. Essentially self-taught, he embraced sculpture as his mean for expression. Without any kind of formal academic education or training in the arts, perseverance and praxis made him an artist. His work has been influenced by cuban master Agustin Cardenas and british Henry Moore. In his early years until 1994 he produced a large amount of small and medium scale wooden sculptures. From 1994 to the present, Almaguer creates and produces steel sculptures. It's with his works on steel where he encounters a strong expression with a striking liberty hard to deliver in wood. His monumental sculptures were recently exhibited at Miami Dade...
Category

21st Century and Contemporary Abstract Abstract Sculptures

Materials

Steel

Metal Corten Steel Abstract Geometric Folded Origami Sculpture Gerald DiGiusto
By Gerald DiGgiusto
Located in Surfside, FL
Gerald DiGiusto (1929 - 1987) Signed and dated abstract geometric COR-ten steel sculpture, (an all weather steel appropriate for outdoor use) "Folded" Angled Geometric Forms like a ...
Category

1980s Abstract Geometric Abstract Sculptures

Materials

Steel

Swiss Op Art Mirror Polished Metal Stainless Steel Sculpture Relief Will Weber
Located in Surfside, FL
Willy Weber, (Swiss, 1933-1998) Verchromte Platte Stainless steel sculptural construction, dated 1977, signed to the steel. Dimensions: 12" ht. x 13" wd. Sculpted chrome sheet Hand ...
Category

1970s Op Art Abstract Sculptures

Materials

Steel

Untitled, Steel, Iron Bella Feldman Brutalist Sculpture
By Bella Feldman
Located in Surfside, FL
Bella Feldman (American, b. 1930), Untitled, metal 2-wheeled cart with metal cables, (Provenance: Allan Stone Gallery, New York, NY) gallery label affixed affixed verso, overall: 37"h x 48"l x 37"w. Provenance: Private Collection Bella Feldman is an American sculptor whose work addresses the themes of sexuality, war, and the persistent anxiety of the industrial age. Feldman is known for pioneering the use of glass with steel. Her work has affinities with Surrealism, Post-Minimalism, and the Feminist art movement, although she has no formal affiliation with these. A Professor Emeritus at the California College of the Arts, Feldman lives and works in Oakland, CA and London, England. Bella Feldman was born in 1930 in New York City to a family of working-class Jewish immigrants from Poland. She grew up in the Bronx tenements. Feldman attended The High School of Music & Art in Manhattan during World War II. Students were required to visit museums and galleries as part of the curriculum. When Feldman was thirteen, she visited her first art museum, the Museum of Modern Art. There, she saw Meret Oppenheim’s Object (1936), the fur-lined cup and saucer, and was struck by her strong psychological response to this work. Other early influences included Alberto Giacometti’s The Palace at 4 a.m. (1932) and the sculpture of David Smith. One of Feldman’s earliest sculptures Warrior (1952) pays tribute to Giacometti. During the Holocaust, Feldman lost numerous family members who remained in Poland, an experience that helped shape her worldview. This includes her life-long preoccupation with war, and the overwhelming effects of the military-industrial complex. Feldman received a BA from Queens College, City University of New York. She married Leonard Feldman at age 18, and moved to California with him in 1951 where they both accepted teaching positions. Feldman has two children, Nina Feldman, born 1954 and Ethan Feldman, born 1956. In 1965, Feldman started teaching at the California College of the Arts. In 1971 she and her family moved to Uganda, East Africa on a grant from the E. L. Cabot Trust Fund at Harvard University. Feldman spent two years teaching art in Uganda prior to the genocidal war in that country. Upon her return to CCA, she faced gender discrimination and a threat to her job. Her successful fight to retain her position prompted her to later become an advocate for other women faculty, who she helped to achieve equity and job security. Feldman was awarded an MA in 1973 from San Jose State University. Her teachers were Sam Richardson...
Category

20th Century Contemporary Abstract Sculptures

Materials

Steel, Iron

Modernist Sculpture Figural Portrait Bust Brutalist Wire Work
By Irving George Lehman
Located in Surfside, FL
This piece is unsigned. Irving Lehman (1900-1983) was an American Jewish painter, sculptor, engraver, and designer. Born in Kiev in then Russia, Lehman studied at the Art Students League, Cooper Union and the National Academy of Art and spent much of his working life in New York City. Part of the Abstract Expressionist school, he worked in oil and watercolor as a painter and in metal and steel as a sculptor; his works have been shown in galleries in England, France, Italy, Israel and Japan, and were included in an international traveling exhibition in Europe in 1951. Like many other artists of his generation, he painted for the WPA and then adopted a more abstract style after WWII. Lehman spent much of his career in NYC. He had his first exhibition at ACA Gallery in 1934. He also exhibited at the Whitney, National Academy, PAFA, Brooklyn Museum, Chicago Art Institute, and others. This work contains Constructivist elements anticipating the more gestural abstraction of the post-WWII New York Abstract Expressionist School. Member of American Art Congress, worked near Woodstock and in Columbia County...
Category

Mid-20th Century Modern Abstract Sculptures

Materials

Steel

Italian Silvana Cenci Signed Mid Century Modern Steel Gold Explosion Sculpture
By Silvana Cenci
Located in Surfside, FL
Silvana Cenci, internationally renowned explosive sculptor, died October 1, 2000 at her home in Gray. Ms. Cenci, who was born in Florence, Italy, before World War II, married Stuart Church and moved to the U.S. permanently in 1959. She lived in Boston for many years, where she was a founder of the Brookline Art Center and a founding member of Summerthing. She exhibited widely throughout Europe and the U.S., and her work is in many museums and public and private collections. After moving to the States, Ms. Cenci began working with new technologies from the aircraft industry, and with explosives. She moved to Northwood, NH, in the early 60s, and pursued and perfected her revolutionary experimentation with explosive sculpture in stainless steel. A native of Italy, she lived most of her life in America where she became internationally known, primarily for using dynamite to blast images into stainless steel and finishing some pieces with pure gold. The pieces created with dynamite were often utilized by architects. One piece titled “Wheels in Motion” hung in Boston’s South Station. Education and Training Accademia di Belle Arti, Florence, Italy Academie de la Grande Chaumiere, Paris Lewis and Clark College, Portland, Oregon Selected Individual Exhibitions Galleria Numero, Florence, Italy Galleria San Carlo, Naples, Italy Galleria d'Arte Totti, Milan, Italy Galeria Beno, Zurich, Switzerland Nova Gallery, Boston Weeden Gallery, Boston Capricorn Gallery, New York City Roach-Hoffman Gallery, Naples, Florida Bristol Art Museum, Bristol, Rhode Island, retrospective Frank Tanzer Gallery, Boston Symphony Hall, Boston Musica Viva, Cambridge, Massachusetts Los Llanos Gallery, Santa Fe, New Mexico Northern Arizona University, Flagstaff Selected Group Exhibitions "Oregon Artists," Lincoln County Art Center, Lincoln, Oregon "Exhibition of Painting and Sculpture," Henry Art Gallery, Seattle, Washington "West Coast Sculptors," Portland Art Museum, Portland, Oregon "Mostra Nazionale del Bianco e Nero," Museo Civico Castello Urasino, Catania, Italy "New England Art Today," Northwestern University, Boston "New England Sculptors Association," Boston City Hall, Boston "Silvana Cenci and Calvin Libby," Bristol Art Museum, Bristol, Rhode Island "Adele Seronde and Silvana Cenci," Weeden Gallery, Boston "Contemporary Italian Art-Italian Heritage," Boston City Hall, Boston, catalog "Explosion of Form, Color, Imagination: Works by Silvana Cenci Selected Awards First Honorable Mention, "Design in Transit," Massachusetts Bay Transportation Authority Competition, Institute of Contemporary Art, Boston, Massachusetts Research in Creative Art Grant, Blanche E. Colman Foundation, Boston, Massachusetts Statue of Victory, World Culture Prize for Letters, Arts and Sciences, Centro Studi e Ricerche delle Nazioni, Salsomaggiore Terme, Italy Harvard-pedigreed architect Harlow Carpenter built the Bundy in 1962. The venue's first decade was lively with exhibitions that featured a large cast of artists, including Dino Basaldella, Judith Brown, Silvana Cenci, Xavier Corbero...
Category

Mid-20th Century Modern Abstract Sculptures

Materials

Gold, Steel

You May Also Like

The Beach, 36"wide mixed media, unique sculpture
Located in Loveland, CO
"The Beach" by Chapel 20x36x6" one-of-a-kind sculpture Mixed Media: Cast Bronze, Marble, Stainless Steel, Steel This particular piece is available from the estate of the artist. It is in excellent, like-new, condition. Shipping price includes the custom packing necessary for safe transport of fine art. Chapel, 1948-2021, Artist's Statement: “I was raised on the Western Slope of Colorado, with almost unfettered access to the American wilderness. I currently reside on a sailboat in Oakland, CA with my studio in nearby San Leandro. I work with permanent materials including bronze, steel, stainless steel, aluminum, glass and stone. It is my contention that a work of art must include a complete environment, not just a single object. In my opinion, it is very difficult to convey meaning with either pure abstraction, or pure representation. Describing an abstract concept with another abstraction does not define the subject. There is nothing in a completely non-objective artwork from the viewers experience upon which to base some meaning. One the other hand, a completely realistic presentation doesn't define an abstraction any better than a dictionary. This is why my sculpture is a blend - the symbolic joining of modern man with primitive experience. They are in-depth studies of the archetypes and symbols used to communicate their relevance to our everyday lives. Mythology, poetry and art are humanity's attempt to describe the mysteries of life which are beyond our ability to consciously comprehend. This is the appeal of the visual arts, poetry, literature and music; they excite an emotional response, or memory that transcends mere words.” - Ron Chapel...
Category

Early 2000s Contemporary Sculptures

Materials

Marble, Steel, Stainless Steel, Bronze

Silent Head
By James Lloyd
Located in Napa, CA
"Metaphors, symbols, the material world, the collective unconscious and the spiritual realm generate the sources in which I investigate images for the viewer to interact with. Becaus...
Category

21st Century and Contemporary Abstract Sculptures

Materials

Bronze, Steel

Image Head
By James Lloyd
Located in Napa, CA
"Metaphors, symbols, the material world, the collective unconscious and the spiritual realm generate the sources in which I investigate images for the viewer to interact with. Becaus...
Category

21st Century and Contemporary Abstract Sculptures

Materials

Bronze, Steel

Silent Head II
By James Lloyd
Located in Napa, CA
"Metaphors, symbols, the material world, the collective unconscious and the spiritual realm generate the sources in which I investigate images for the viewer to interact with. Becaus...
Category

21st Century and Contemporary Abstract Sculptures

Materials

Bronze, Steel

"PORTALS AND PASSAGES 4-20", Industrial Abstract Sculpture in metal
By John Van Alstine
Located in New York, NY
"PORTALS AND PASSAGES 4-20" by John Van Alstine Bronze, pigmented and sealed steel The sculpture of John Van Alstine beautifully, and powerfully, balances the union of stone and met...
Category

2010s Abstract Abstract Sculptures

Materials

Metal, Steel, Bronze

Mythomane
By Danette Landry
Located in Napa, CA
Bronze and Concrete on Polished Steel Stand. Born and raised in Detroit, Michigan, Danette Landry was a longtime resident of California before moving to Paris to pursue studies in c...
Category

2010s Contemporary Abstract Sculptures

Materials

Concrete, Bronze, Steel

Recently Viewed

View All