Recent Trends in Sculpture

Since the 1960s, sculptors have continued to work in a variety of media and styles. Anthony Caro, in England, creates powerful metal constructions, which generally have a horizontal axis.

Americans working in metal on a monumental scale include George

Rickey, who composes delicate stainless steel structures set into

motion by the wind, and Richard Serra, who builds enormous outdoor

structures of steel, such as the 61-m (200-ft) St. John's Rotary Arc (1980) at the New York City exit from the Holland

Tunnel under the Hudson River.

Conceptualism, an important current throughout the 1970s, was strongly influenced by the work and writings of Duchamp. Aiming

to give aesthetic precedence to the artist's ideas, conceptualism sometimes dispensed

with substantial works altogether, grading into performance art. The most influential

contemporary conceptualist was the German Joseph Beuys, whose works satirized postwar

German society and recalled his experience as a downed Luftwaffe pilot during World War II, and who was a popular public performer as

well.

During the 1980s and 1990s, sculptors began moving away from the austerity of minimalism and conceptualism. Organic

and eccentric forms began to reappear, a tendency known as postmodern or postminimalist sculpture. Figurative

motifs could be seen in the simple, small-scale works of the American Joel Shapiro.

Another American, Nancy Graves, was noted for her whimsical, brightly-colored

open-work assemblages.

Famous Filipino sculptors are Guillermo Toletino, Napoleon Abueva, Saprid, Castrillo and

many others. Most of their works are landmarks in places of interest

in the Philippines.