Artist of the day: Artist of the Day, July 20, 2022: Zenos Frudakis, an American sculptor (#1626)

Wednesday, July 20, 2022

Artist of the Day, July 20, 2022: Zenos Frudakis, an American sculptor (#1626)

Zenos Frudakis (1951), known as Frudakis, is an American sculptor whose diverse body of work includes monuments, memorials, portrait busts and statues of living and historic individuals, military subjects, sports figures and animal sculpture. Over the past four decades he has sculpted monumental works and over 100 figurative sculptures included within public and private collections throughout the United States and internationally. Frudakis currently lives and works near Philadelphia, and is best known for his sculpture Freedom, which shows a series of figures breaking free from a wall and is installed in downtown Philadelphia.

Born in San Francisco, Frudakis is the oldest of five children. He was born to Greek-American parents, and was raised primarily in Northwestern Indiana, with the exception of several years in Wheeling, West Virginia. As a child, Frudakis first began to sculpt under the family's kitchen table with a piece of dough given to him by his mother as she was preparing to bake bread. Growing up in Greek family culture, Frudakis began drawing and reading at a young age, initiating a lifelong discipline of studying and creating art each day. Artistic inspirations come from ancient Greeks, and sculptors Michelangelo, Bernini, Carpeaux and Rodin. Throughout his life, Frudakis has been an avid reader with a wide range of interests that inform his work.

Frudakis' initial years in college were close to home in the Gary, Indiana area due to illness of his father. During this time, he spent summers working in steel mills, and in 1970 to 1971, attended Indiana University Northwest Extension.

In 1972, Frudakis moved to Philadelphia to study at the Pennsylvania Academy of the Fine Arts. Concurrently, he also studied sculpture privately with Prix de Rome winner Evangelos Frudakis, his elder brother. Frudakis studied painting privately with Prix de Rome winner James Hanes. From 1977 to 1983, he attended the University of Pennsylvania, where Frudakis earned bachelor's and master's degrees in Fine Arts.

In 1976, Frudakis married Rosalie Gluchoff. Together they began a gallery and ran Frudakis Studio, located in center city Philadelphia. Frudakis' first important commission was a portrait sculpture of Samuel L. Evans, founder of the American Foundation for Negro Affairs (AFNA); followed by portrait sculptures of Wilson Goode, former Mayor of Philadelphia, Pa; The Honorable K. Leroy Irvis, the first African American to serve as a State Legislature's Speaker of the House; and Joseph E. Coleman, former City Council President, Philadelphia, Pa.

Frudakis continued sculpting commissions with an emphasis on the figure and the portrait, as demonstrated in his many monumental works, individual portrait statues and busts, and bas-reliefs. He created sculptures of living and historic individuals that express the character and vitality of his subjects while capturing an accurate likeness.

Some of Frudakis's sculptures have generated controversy. When he sculpted a life-size bronze bust of Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. for the U.S. Embassy in Pretoria, South Africa, apartheid was still in effect there. The U.S. government had advised Frudakis he could be jailed for bringing the sculpture into South Africa, so the bust was brought into the country in 1989 by diplomatic pouch. The sculpture was installed just inside the embassy's fence, visible to the public but outside the South African government's reach, standing as a statement of the U.S.’s opposition to apartheid.

Frudakis' statue of attorney Clarence Darrow reawakened tensions between local evolutionists and creationists when it was installed outside the Rhea County Courthouse in Dayton, Tn, in 2017. The courthouse was the site of the 1925 Scopes "monkey trial," in which John T. Scopes was accused of unlawful teaching of human evolution in a state-funded school. Darrow represented Scopes, while William Jennings Bryan argued for the prosecution. Since 2005, a sculpture of Bryan has been on display on the courthouse lawn. The Darrow sculpture was commissioned by the Freedom From Religion Foundation and installed on the lawn in balance to the Bryan sculpture.

Frudakis has been commissioned to create bronze portrait busts, statues, and monuments of significant figures from the sports world, including golf, baseball, hockey and boxing.
Payne Stewart, Pinehurst

Frudakis’ larger-than-life sculptures include Baseball Hall of Famers Mike Schmidt, Steve Carlton, Richie Ashburn and Robin Roberts, all on view at Citizens Bank Park, Philadelphia. A relief sculpture of Coach Staffieri is at University of Pennsylvania's Franklin Field. A public monument at the DiMaggio Children's Hospital, Hollywood, Florida, shows Joe DiMaggio kneeling to speak to a young boy, and includes the inscription, "We never stand so tall as when we stoop to help a child."

The 8-foot bronze statue honoring Palm Beach Gardens’ city founder John D. MacArthur is mounted on a 3-foot base of granite from a quarry in Vermont. Unveiled on November 21, 2010 as part of the city's 50th anniversary celebration, the sculpture is installed at the city hall entrance on Military Trail.

The memorial sculpture of Nina Simone depicts the "High Priestess of Soul" seated atop a stone base while performing on a floating keyboard. The keyboard is sculpted in the form of a wave—evoking the sense of grace, rhythm and music. Simone's daughter, Broadway actress Lisa Simone Kelly posed for Frudakis as he sculpted the eight-foot bronze portrait statue. The memorial of the world-renowned singer and human rights activist includes her ashes within a sculpted heart that is welded to the interior of the figure's chest.

Using Francis Bacon's quote, "Knowledge is Power" as the central theme, Frudakis sculpted this monument to inspire the process and pleasure of learning. Using the visual metaphor of an open book, the 8-ft high by 12-ft wide sculpture features Charles Darwin and Albert Einstein emerging from its pages.

The United States Air Force Memorial Honor Guard, a 16-ft high monument, consists of four eight-foot bronze figures, patinaed in blue-gray, standing side by side and mounted on a ten-by-two-foot bronze base. The two middle figures are flag bearers, carrying the United States and Air Force flags and battle streamers, flanked by two rifle guards.

Freedom is the most widely recognized public sculpture by Frudakis. Installed in downtown Philadelphia, at 20 ft. long by 8 ft. high and 7,000 lbs., the monument portrays transformation through the sequential emergence of a figure in four stages of breaking free from a wall.

Influenced by Rodin's Gates of Hell, Frudakis includes many smaller sculptures and personal elements within the monument's wall. The bronze's maquette, the sculptor's hand and sculpture tools are cast into the wall. The anatomical man as well as portraits, figures and reliefs are shown partially sculpted, revealing the process of creation.

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