Bruce Beasley

This richly illustrated volume celebrates six decades of the sculptor Bruce Beasley’s works in a wide range of media and will serve as the definitive treatment of his distinguished career. For six decades, sculptor Bruce Beasley has worked in a range of media to build complex, resonant sculptures that communicate the primacy of form and express the emotional language of shape. Bruce Beasley: Sixty Year Retrospective is an elegant survey of his illustrious career: from early experiments in scrap iron during the 1960s; aluminum works of the 1970s; cast acrylic sculptures of the 1970s and 80s; and stone, stainless steel and bronze works of the 1990s to the present day. The catalog also features Beasley’s latest venture into two-dimensional media.This richly illustrated book includes Beasley’s reflections on his career. In a conversation, Beasley and Lawrence Weschler discuss art and activism. Essays discussing his processes and appraising his impact are written by curator Tom Moran and Marlena Doktorczyk-Donohue, Director of the Bruce Beasley Foundation and Professor of Art History at Otis College of Art and Design, Los Angeles.6 Director’s Foreword 7 Artist Acknowledgments 8 In Retrospect: The Artist in His Own Words Bruce Beasley 14 Bruce Beasley: Innovation and the Primacy of Form Tom Moran 24 Bruce Beasley: In Pursuit of Form Marlena Doktorczyk-Donohue 30 But For Real: A Conversation with Bruce Beasley on Art and Social Activism Lawrence Weschler 38 Postscript: Tools, Techniques, and Media and Their Validity in Creativity Bruce Beasley 39 Sixty Year Retrospective 119 Other Notable Works 132 Sculptures in Response to the Virus 142 Chronology 161 Selected Collections, Exhibitions, Awards and Prizes, and Public Commissions 170 Selected Bibliography 174 Checklist 176 Index 179 About the Contributors 180 About GFS