Artist Acknowledgments

I’dlike to acknowledge first and foremost my wife, Laurence, helpmate and mother of our two children. She has supported my efforts, been beside me for the last 49 years, and is the creator of many of the beautiful patinas that give my work their unique cadence. I owe her thanks for being the entry point for my own involvement in prehistoric art, and all who care about the earliest marks made by our first ancestral artists owe Laurence gratitude for single-handedly initiating and leading the fight to save the cave art of Lascaux.

Albert Dicruttalo is a serious and accomplished sculptor in his own right, and a friend and colleague who has been my right hand for 26 years. He is a person of depth and integrity, highly skilled, and deeply trusted. The work we do is widely varied; challenging, sometimes mundane, often exhausting, and always requiring attention and stamina. We work together using cranes and forklifts, involving heavy loads that are dangerous to us and with any error could destroy a finished piece. The work that Albert has assisted me with for nearly three decades demands absolute mutual trust. There isn’t anyone else I would want to do this with.

Marti LeBlanc has worked diligently as my executive assistant for 30 years. She frees me from my desk and competently, intelligently handles critical details so that I can maximize my time in the studio. Highly skilled and trusted with all office tasks I try to avoid, she is intuitive and sensitive, and knows when to press for my attention and when she can spare me and handle what comes up on her own.

Marlena Doktorczyk-Donohue is the dedicated director of the Bruce Beasley Foundation and a professor of modern and contemporary art history at Otis College of Art and Design in Los Angeles. From her first interview with me as a critic covering my Oakland Museum retrospective some years ago, she has come to know and understand my work and the true nature of my engagement in it better than anyone else.

I must also acknowledge three colleagues, without whom my work and world would have been far less rich. Eduardo Chillida, the artist I admire above all others. A man who was as deep and full of integrity as his work. I know of no other artist who worked in so many different media and found in each an expression that was uniquely his own. The iron pieces—grappling with space, strong and dynamic; the wood pieces—rough and almost frightening in their intensity; the stone pieces—with such serene presence; the clay pieces— so contained and intimate; and the monumental works in concrete—with such strength and presence that they feel like they must have just appeared out of the land by themselves. It was my greatest honor to have known him.

Giò Pomodoro, an Italian master sculptor and deep lover of all sculpture from all eras. We talked endlessly about what sculpture is and isn’t, and what it can be and what it cannot. Together we hiked the abandoned quarries in Pietrasanta, which had been cut into the mountains, and we marveled endlessly at how nature was slowly blending and softening the geometric precision imposed by man.

Kenneth Snelson, an American artist who more than any sculptor I know really created his own unique language. His sculptures taught me much; they are so strong and yet so light, vigorously engaging yet containing space at the same time. This was a man who endlessly pondered the basic structure of matter itself, and was such good company and found humor in every adversity.

And finally, I would like to express my profound thanks to everyone at Grounds For Sculpture, but in particular Gary Garrido Schneider, executive director, Faith McClellan, director of collections and exhibitions, and Tom Moran, chief curator, whose intelligence, warmth, and fully committed and exceptionally professional support allowed this 60-year retrospective to move from an idea many years ago to a stunning reality today.

Bruce Beasley Oakland, California