Born in Dubuque, Iowa, Sandy Scott became one of the foremost animal sculptors in the Southwest in the late 20th century. Her subjects include all kinds of birds as well as domestic and wild animals.
At age two, she moved with her family to Tulsa, Oklahoma where she lived until enrolling in the Kansas City Art Institute from 1961 to 1965. She then worked for Calvin Motion Pictures in animation and worked as a flight attendant and also earned her pilot's license.
In 1969, she moved to Hawaii and shortly after to San Francisco, where she worked as a portrait artist and illustrator. She also spent much time in wilderness areas, did offshore sailing, and traveled in Europe. In 1975, she moved to a rural area near Austin, Texas and began doing etchings, making a name for herself with sporting scenes. In 1978, she did a series of rodeo etchings for the National Cowboy Hall of Fame in Oklahoma and had a one-woman show there of more than 60 etchings.
That same year, she bought a cabin at Lake of the Woods, Ontario, and in 1982, she completed her first sculpture, which began a new and highly productive phase of her career.
In the next two decades she won numerous awards and was voted into prestigious organizations including the Pen and Brush and Northwest Rendezvous Group. In 1987, she bought a former canning factory on ten acres near Fort Collins, Colorado, and from then divided her time between there and her island home at Lake of the Woods in Ontario, Canada.
Source:
Southwest Art magazine
Sandy Scott was trained at the Kansas City Art Institute. She worked as an animation background artist for the motion picture industry before turning her attention to etching and printmaking in the 1970s' and to sculpture in the 1980s'.
A licensed pilot for over 30 years, she feels her knowledge of aerodynamics has been helpful in achieving the illusion of movement in her bird sculpture.
Her list of awards and prizes for sculpture and etching is impressive. It includes:
-The National Academy of Design, New York
-Allied Artists, New York
-New York Pen and Brush
-American Artist's Professional League
-Catherine Lorillard Wolfe Art Club, New York.
-Gold Medal for Sculpture, National Academy of Western Art
Sandy is on the teaching staff of the Scottsdale Artists' School in Scottsdale, Arizona and the Loveland Academy of Fine Art, Loveland, Colorado. These art instruction institutions include the top recognized professional artists on an international level.
She is a member of the following juried organizations:
-American Artist's Professional League - New York
-Catherine Lorillard Wolfe Art Club - New York
-New York Pen and Brush
-Society of Animal Artists
-Northwest Rendezvous Group
The Thomas Gilcrease Museum honored Sandy with a major retrospective exhibition in "Rendezvous '98".
Spirit of the Wild Things, a book about Sandy's work was published in 1998.
Sandy's work may be seen in many public installations and museums, including National Wildlife Museum, Jackson, Wyoming
1% for Arts Fountain Commission, Albuquerque, New Mexico
Opryland Hotel, Nashville, Tennessee
Margaret Thatcher, Great Britain
R.W. Norton Museum, Shreveport, Louisiana
Trammell Crow Corp., Chicago, Illinois
Museum of Arts and Crafts, San Antonio, Texas
R.D.Hubbard Collection, Ruidoso, New Mexico
Western Art Exhibit, People's Republic of China
President and Mrs. George Bush, Houston, Texas
Ritz Carlton Hotel, Aspen, Colorado
Brookgreen Gardens, Murrells Inlet, South Carolina
and President and Mrs. Gerald Ford, Vail, Colorado
United States Military Academy, West Point, New York
Sculptor and printmaker Sandy Scott feels very strongly for, and about, her subject. She has quickly climbed to the top of her field using observation, incorporating a sense of motion and mood and attentively fine tuning her skills. A widely admired printmaker of sporting scene etchings in the 1970s, Scott turned to sculpting in the early 1980s, focusing primarily on birds. Nearly two decades later, she has matured technically and artistically moving between subjects wild and domestic, including keen-eyed eagles, sinuous trout, elegant dogs, robust pigs, powerful horses, exotic macaws and arrogant roosters.
Robin Salmon, curator of sculpture at Brookgreen Gardens, writes of Scott that she is "the continuing thread of the animalier in American art." The book, Spirit of the Wild Things, published on the occasion of the Gilcrease Museum Rendezvous '98, documents Scott's career and artistic development.
"With a father who is an outdoorsman, my love of the outdoors was cultivated at an early age," explains Sandy. "I've always loved to fish, and I've backpacked and camped in some of this country's most beautiful places." This lifestyle has left lasting impressions on Sandy, and it is this feeling of love for nature which radiates from her work.
Although at times she works in the field, Sandy prefers the calm of the studio for her creative work. "But it is not feasible to stage a herd of elk or a gaggle of geese in my studio," she says, "so I rely on my field trips for inspiration. Much of my field work is done with a camera, and I have thousands of frames of 35mm film which provide a very valuable source of reference. I strive to retain in my work the feeling and emotion experienced while observing, sketching, and photographing in the field."
Sculptor and printmaker (etchings), Sandy Scott, feels very strongly for and about her subjects. A widely admired etcher of sporting scenes in the 1970s, Scott turned to sculpting in the early 1980s, focusing primarily on birds. Nearly two decades later, she has matured technically and artistically, moving adeptly between subjects wild and domestic, including keen-eyed eagles, sinuous trout, elegant dogs, robust pigs, powerful horses, exotic macaws and arrogant roosters.
Today Scott is recognized as one of the country's premier animal sculptors, interweaving, as Robin Salmon, curator of sculpture at Brookgreen Gardens, writes, "the continuing thread of the animalier in American art."
The book, Spirit of the Wild Things, published on the occasion of the Gilcrease Museum Rendezvous 1998, documents Scott's career and artistic development. Sandy's unique background has enabled her to capture the spirit of her subjects with a heartfelt vitality and technical skill. "With a father who is an outdoorsman, my love of the outdoors was cultivated at an early age," explains Sandy. "I've always loved to fish, and I've backpacked and camped in some of this country's most beautiful places."
This lifestyle has left lasting impressions on Sandy, and it is this feeling of love for nature which radiates from her work. Although at times she works from life, Sandy prefers the calm of the studio for her creative work. "But it is not feasible to stage a herd of elk or a gaggle of geese in my studio," she says, "so I rely on my field trips for inspiration. Much of my field work is done with a camera, and I have thousands of frames of 35mm film which provide a very valuable source of reference. I strive to retain in my work the feeling and emotion experienced while observing, sketching, and photographing in the field."
Trained at the Kansas City Art Institute, Sandy Scott worked as an animation background artist for the motion picture industry before turning her attention to etching and printmaking in the 1970's and to sculpture in the 1980's.
She has been a licensed pilot for over 25 years and feels her knowledge of aerodynamics has been helpful in achieving the illusion of movement in her bird sculpture.
Her list of awards and prizes for sculpture and etching includes: The National Academy of Design, New York; Allied Artists, New York; New York Pen and Brush; American Artist's Professional League; Catherine Lorillard Wolfe Art Club, New York; Gold Medal for Sculpture, National Academy of Western Art.
Sandy is on the teaching staff of the prestigious Scottsdale Artists' School in Scottsdale, Arizona. This staff includes the top recognized professional artists on an international level.
She is a member of the following juried organizations: American Artist's Professional League; Catherine Lorillard Wolfe Art Club, New York; New York Pen and Brush; Society of Animal Artists; and Northwest Rendezvous Group
She maintains a studio in Fort Collins, Colorado, and one on an island on Lake of the Woods in Ontario, Canada.
Known for her animal sculpture, Sandy Scott first gained artistic recognition for her sporting scene etchings in the 1970s. Moving to sculpture in the early 1980s, Scott used observation and a sense of motion to create works that were not only graceful, but accurate representations of the wild animals of which she is so fond.
Growing up with a father who was an avid outdoorsman allowed Sandy the opportunity to garner an appreciation for the beauty and practicality of wild animals. It is this love of nature and wild life that is reflected in her work, from soaring eagles to lumbering bears, from arrogant roosters to elegant dogs. Using her camera to capture these creatures in their natural state allows Scott to work from reference in her studio. Today she continues to work from her studio in Colorado, capturing in bronze the creatures of the region.
