Modern Sculpture

"Modern Sculpture: Artists in Their Own Words is the most comprehensive anthology of reflections on sculpture by artists who have been defining and redefining its identity during the past 108 years. Douglas Dreishpoon's selections of artists and texts, and thematic groupings, provide welcome access to a startling array of voices, from whose words it is clear how sculpture became the term through which the creative boldness of modern art is most eloquently revealed."—Michael Brenson, art critic and art historian

"If we were to think of the notion of plasticity as being a sculptural form before it gets flattened out, as Matisse and Picasso (who were both painters and sculptors) would have pictorially and viscerally agreed, we would then argue how Paleolithic cave paintings must have started out with our ancestral hands touching the irregular surfaces of the cave walls before determining, however concave or convex they may feel, which segments would be fitting for the bodies of the animals and which may correlate to their surroundings. By ennobling the voices of artists, Douglas Dreishpoon has brilliantly concocted the history of modern and contemporary sculpture with flawless continuity while reaffirming that the sense of touch or being touched, materialized in the made object, is simply the truest testament of our existence. This is an essential reading for all artists and lovers of art indeed."—Phong H. Bui, cofounder, publisher, and artistic director of the Brooklyn Rail, Rail Editions, Rail Curatorial Projects, and the River Rail