artistic resume for fred manasse

FRED MANASSE- Artistic Resume
In all of my sculpture I want to let my passions and emotions dominate the pieces I create rather than slavishly trying to make accurate representations of what I see directly. I have sculpted in Clay (both wet and oil based) and have recently started to work in Granite and Marble and been elected a member of the Board of Trustees of the Carving Center and Sculpture studio in West Rutland Vermont. I am a member of the Cape Cod Artist Association (CCAA) and exhibited there. I am also a member of the Newton Art Association.

In my figurative work, although I try to work accurately by looking at the model when I have formed the piece I then modify it a bit to better reflect my own emotion and mood so as to be able to represent more specifically, what my imagination can dream up. I have only begun to exhibit seriously recently (2008), having previously shown my work to members of my men’s group and at one open studio in Newton MA, as well as participating in a group exhibition at the Millbrook Gallery in Concord NH in the summer of 2007. I have exhibited some pieces at the Cape Cod Artist Association gallery in Barnstable MA and won an Honorable mention in sculpture at their Nationals exhibition for my piece on the holocaust “My diaspora”, which relates to my early family history in wartime Europe.

Although educated as an Electrical Engineer and Physicist, throughout my 50 year career in Industry, academia and as an entrepreneur, I was always interested in art, fueled by traveling extensively all over the world and visiting museums and cathedrals. I was especially fascinated by sculpture and stained glass. I have also been collecting antiques, acquired many paintings and other works of art and crafts. However, until about 15 years ago, I never thought that I could create art myself. I befriended a stained glass artist and she took me on as an apprentice. I was soon designing and creating on my own.

About 8 years ago, I moved on to trying to sculpt by apprenticing myself to a modern sculptor in a Waltham studio and quickly learned how to work with plaster and make small objects (mostly fruits) in more durable materials such as clay, fiberglass, and eventually castings in aluminum and bronze. Since I retired from Raytheon a few years ago, I have been able to get more formal training in wet clay based fired and glazed ceramics by studying at the Harvard/Radcliffe studio and at Framingham State College. I was then able to create hand crafted imaginative pottery works which I did and even did some sculptural work. As I improved in my skills I joined a group of other sculptors which became the Beaumont Sculpture Studio, and have now been a member of that Apprenticeship Program in oil based clay doing figurative sculpture for 4 years.