Joel Shapiro

Born in New York in 1940, Joel Shapiro is an internationally recognized artist who has done over thirty commissions and has had hundreds of solo exhibitions and retrospectives. HBS acquired Untitled in 2005 for the permanent collection. Many of Shapiro’s large bronze sculptures, including Untitled, are first made in wood, serving as patterns for the versions cast in bronze. The original wood grain remains in the final bronze casting; the artist’s intention is to reference the entire process of its making. The resulting dynamic arrangements of rectangular forms recall figures moving in space. Shapiro’s works are meant to engage with the surrounding architecture and landscape with a human—if abstracted—presence. His figurative sculptures are also a response to abstract Minimalist works of the 1960s. His work is in numerous private and public collections including the National Gallery of Art in Washington, DC; Museum of Modern Art; Whitney Museum of American Art; and Tate Gallery, London. He is married to the artist Ellen Phelan, and lives and works in New York City.