The Art of Balancing Stones

Milford native Steven Warzel applies focus and skill to balance beach stones into amazing forms like castles and dragons, only to have them reclaimed by the sea at the next rising tide.

Warzel’s unique art, which requires nothing more than a bunch of rocks, his hands, and the ability to feel the force of gravity, allows him to balance random stones into complex forms that inspire and amaze—and stir media attention. Recent stories about Warzel’s rock sculptures have appeared in regional papers and on Ann Nyberg’s WTNH Channel 8 human interest program.

While the 57-year-old artist, husband, and father is relatively new to the stone-balancing art (he started less than a decade ago) his entire youth was immersed in creativity. “My grandfather Frank Smith, my mom’s dad, was an awardwinning woodworker of free-form tables and furniture and he won a couple awards in craft shows around New England,” states Warzel. “And my dad Joseph Warzel was just one of those guys who knew how to fix it all and do it all.”

Smith’s furniture still graces people’s homes, which Warzel says he gets to see occasionally. Later in life, Smith developed yet another craft. “He got into calligraphy, making calligraphy of poems on pieces of wood and I see those all the time in people’s houses,” he says, adding, “That introduced me to poetry and literature.”

Artistic talent was not just limited to one side of the Warzel family, however. “I found out my dad’s dad was an artist too, but he died very young, so I never knew him.”

Based on those family influences during his formative years, Warzel began drawing as a child, thanks to his love of Marvel Comics, Jack Kirby, and other artists he admired. “Their art just blew my mind when I was a little kid,” recalls Warzel. “I grew up in the ‘70s, so all that pop-art of Marvel Comics and Frank Frazetta and Tolkien’s Lord of the Rings was a big deal for me.”

Another 20th century arts master who also had a profound effect on the young Warzel was the famed stop-motion animator Ray Harryhausen. “I went through a stop-motion phase when I was a kid and made monster movies with clay figures,” he says.

“Harryhausen’s movies were a massive influence and I still watch them to this day.”

As the years passed, all the creative influences and desires simmered inside Warzel’s mind and spirit. The day arrived nine years ago when he found his own unique position as an artist all because of a need to get outside coupled with his creative way of looking at something as innocuous as rocks strewn on a beach.

When asked how and why he began piling beach stones into shapes, structures, and animal forms, Warzel points to a need that came deep from within. “I don’t mean to sound over dramatic, but I went through a bad time in life and there was a real need to just go outside and play and have fun again,” was on Anchor Beach and there were all these it,” Warzel will say to himself. “When I walk around, I say there should be a dragon over there and that’s a perfect spot for a castle. That’s how my mind works. I saw the rocks and one day I just started balancing them and I didn’t think people were going to like it as much as they do. The outpouring of people stopping and watching me, they just loved it.”

Viewers are always welcome, yet sometimes Warzel will go off by himself and build a stone sculpture while enjoying the quiet of no audience watching.