Paul Stankard
Paul Joseph Stankard is an internationally acclaimed artist and pioneer in the studio glass movement. He is considered a living master in the art of the paperweight. His work is represented in more than 60 museums around the world including the Metropolitan Museum of Art in New York, the Victoria and Albert in London and the Musee des Arts Decoratifs, Palais du Louvre in Paris. His extraordinary career has taken him from modest beginnings as a scientific flame-worker to solo museum exhibitions at the Museum of Arts & Design in New York and the Renwick Gallery of the Smithsonian Institution. Over his forty-year artistic journey, he has received three honorary degrees and many awards within the glass community. He is the author of two books; the autobiographical No Green Berries or Leaves and Spark the Creative Flame, a probe into the community flame-working glassmakers.
Doug Heller wrote about him: “Looking at a Stankard botanical sculpture or paperweight one is immediately struck by the dazzling technical achievement it represents. Years of dedication and experimentation have honed Paul’s natural talent to an extraordinarily high level. Occasionally, Stankard’s subject matter and chosen medium prejudice first time viewers. Yet time and again, people initially approaching the work skeptically have turned into believers, won over by the beauty and persuasive honesty of Stankard’s art. But more than skill is apparent in Stankard’s intimate sculptures. In fact, his unique vision and formidable creative gifts enable him to create what critic James Yood has called ‘… some of the most poetic and nuanced commentary on the wonders of nature as exists in any medium anywhere in contemporary art.’”
