Description
Artist: Frederick Hart
Title: Transcendent
Medium: Lucite
Dimensions: 19" x 11" x 9"
Inscription: Engraved signature
Edition: 96/350 + 60 AP
Year: 1991
Condition: Very good condition
Documentation: Includes Gallery Certificate of authenticity
Frederick Hart's 1991 “Transcendent” lucite sculpture is imbued with a truly sublime presence. Female and male figures emerging from the Lucite seem to appear and disappear within the work. This ghostly effect is created through Hart’s unique process of embedment, which involves casting one acrylic work within another. It is a technique the artist patented in 1982, marking the end of a decade of constant experimentation and progression and the beginning of the period of precise refinement. Consistent with his unique poetic vision, the inner, emotional, intellectual, and spiritual forces dominate the work. Imbued with a distinct sense of grace, this piece is a testament to Hart’s remarkable technical abilities and devotion to the craft.
Frederick Hart's "Transcendent" is signed by the artist and includes a gallery certificate of authenticity. It is from an edition of 350 (+ 60 AP) and the current gallery retail price for the piece is over $40,000.
About Frederick Hart
As one of America’s greatest representational artists, Frederick Hart left a lasting and unique mark in the world of modern sculpture. Born in Atlanta, Georgia in 1943, he studied at the University of South Carolina and after protesting alongside black students during the Civil rights movement, he moved to Washington D.C. to continue his studies at the Corcoran School of Art. Fascinated with the human figure and the classical approach, he started developing his career in 1966 as a stone carver apprentice at the National Cathedral in Washington D.C. Leaving the Cathedral in 1971, Hart started his own studio practice but had little success in the first years. In 1974, he was awarded the project by the Cathedral to create a contemporary interpretation of The Creation, an event that would change his life. Soon, Hart’s career took a turn for the better and in the upcoming decades, he rose to national prominence, becoming a government art advisor in 1985 and receiving the prestigious Henry Hering Award from the National Sculpture Society in 1987.
Best known for his architectural public sculpture work, Frederick Hart remained loyal to the figurative art, speaking very critically of abstract and similar art movements. He was the voice of moral responsibility among artists and the propagator of the classical aesthetic notions in art, representing the group of like-minded artists called “The Centerists”. "My work isn't art for art's sake, it's about life. I have no patience with obscure or unintelligible art - I want to be understood," he used to say, alluding to the higher aspirations and clear message his art delivered. Frederick Hart’s works are celebrated for their beauty and flawless execution, always in movement, layered with emotion, often depicting a form of religious trance or heightened state of awareness. With strong religious undertones, they can be seen as universal allegories, so rare, yet necessary in contemporary life and art.
Despite his traditional views on the artistic substance, Hart was a pioneer in the use of transparent acrylic resin in the creation of figurative sculptures. He patented a process of embedding one sculpture inside another, an innovative method that was not characteristic for religious (or other) sculpture until that time.
Hart died on August 13, 1999, in Baltimore, Maryland.