Arabesque XXXI carved in bubinga wood by Robert Longhurst, c. 2007, University of Michigan
Robert Longhurst is an American sculptor who was born in Schenectady, New York, in 1949. At an early age he was fascinated by his father's small figurative woodcarvings.[1]
Longhurst received a Bachelor of Architecture from Kent State University in 1975. He began his artistic career in 1976 in Cincinnati, Ohio. His first commissioned works were three figurative sculptures in black walnut for Cincinnati businessman Joe David who owned Midwest Woodworking company.[2] In 1978 Longhurst completed a life size figure in pine of an Adirondack hermit, Noah John Rondeau for the Adirondack Museum in Blue Mountain Lake, New York.[3]
Although Longhurst's career began with figurative works, it soon evolved into non-representational abstraction in exotic woods, marble and granite that draws on his background in Architecture. Many of his pieces are defined as being at the intersection of where the fields of art and math overlap, and they have been discussed by mathematicians such as Nathaniel Friedman, Reuben Hersh, and Ivars Peterson.[4][5][6][7] Some of his sculptures portray minimal surfaces, which were named after German geometer Alfred Enneper.[6] Nathaniel Friedman writes, "The surfaces [of Longhurst's sculptures] generally have appealing sections with negative curvature (saddle surfaces). This is a natural intuitive result of Longhurst's feeling for satisfying shape rather than a mathematically deduced result."[5]
Longhurst participated in the International Snow Sculpture Championships in Breckenridge, Colorado, in 2000 and 2001, by joining a snow sculpting team from Minnesota. Two of his sculptures representing minimal surfaces were enlarged and carved from blocks of snow measuring 12' high x 10' wide x 10' deep.[8][9] In the 2000 championships, the team received second place, Artists' Choice Award, and People's Choice Award.[7]
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