The 7th Annual Coconut Point Art Festival takes place on the weekend of February 9 and 10. One of the artists who will be exhibiting at the fair is sculptor Frederick Prescott.
Based in Santa Fe, New Mexico, Prescott travels the country with bold, colorful larger-than-life, animal-inspired kinetic steel sculptures and can be found at many Howard Alan Events. Most of his whimsical creations weigh 4 to 8 tons and many measure up to 20 feet in height.
"I'm in the trucking business," Prescott quipped during a telephone interview today. "We have a flatbed that carries the pieces. It's just as long as anything on the highway."
The trailer is equipped with special boots and straps to ensure that the pieces don't rub each other. "Each sculpture is powder coated," Prescott explains. "We have 20 foot ovens to bake and shoot on the powder. It's like a skin [that's resistant to rust and fading], but it will rub off if its bumped or scraped by another four or five thousand pound piece."
Once on site, Prescott uses a forklift to carefully unload and position the sculptures in his space. "I rent equipment at every show. It takes four or five hours to set up, and another four or five to reload the sculptures at the end of each show."
It may sound like a lot of work, but Prescott relishes the opportunity to exhibit his artwork in Southwest Florida. "The audience in Southwest Floria is very international. People from Europe, Canada, Mexico and South America come to the festivals to look at and buy art, along with folks from New York, Chicago and the rest of the U.S." In fact, Prescott was in the process of packing a sculpture bound for Germany, the result of a sale he made at the Downtown Naples New Year's Weekend Art Festival. International sales are nothing new for Prescott, however. He also has works in corporate and private collections in France, England, Caracos and a host of Canadian cities.
And the big electric orange-pink flamingo he brought to Naples for the New Year's weekend art fair is now on display in the sculpture garden at the very pink Marietta Museum of Art and Whimsy on North Tamiami Trail in Sarasota, Florida. The museum liked the piece so much that they've commissioned a second flamingo. "That one will be finished with clear coat mixed with diamond dust so that it will glow in the dark," Prescott said of the hot pink companion piece.
Born in Palo Alto in 1949, the oldest son of the chief inventor and owner of the Universal Coin Meter Company began working with metal at the age of six. In a playground of band saws, punch presses and metal grinders, Prescott spent countless hours honing the skills he uses to transform metal into art by cutting, bending, and welding.
By age twelve, Prescott was enrolled in a watercolor painting class where he immediately developed a passion for color. The vibrant colors that find their way into his sculptures are drawn from the distinctively electric palette of the contemporary world.
Prescott's pieces evoke the natural world and it’s imaginary counterpart. As he transforms them into the half-real, half-fantastic images, Prescott imbues each one with a tangible manifestation of the joy and humor he finds in all that he observes. Whether depicting frenetic street scenes or the world of animals and nature, all of Prescott's kinetic sculptures are created from his joyful personal perspective that the world is both humorous and colorful.
Since 1974, Prescott has exhibited his work all over the world and created special pieces on commission for both private and corporate collectors, including Walt Disney Co., Porsche, and the Chicago Bulls, among others. Prescott’s larger-than-life sculptures have frequently been installed in public parks and venues, where people of all ages and backgrounds can enjoy them. His work was represented for several years by Martin Lawrence Galleries (which publishes work by Keith Haring, Miro, Picasso and Andy Warhol). He has also been commissioned by a number of Hollywood’s A-listers, including Oprah, Sly Stallone and Steven Spielberg.
For more information about the sculptor or his work, please telephone 505-424-8449 or visit http://www.prescottstudio.com/index.html. For more information on the 7th Annual Coconut Point Art Festival, please visit http://www.artfestival.com.
