American Monuments - Finding New Dimensions: Large Scale Public Works - Real and Imagined, 1982-2022

by John Van Alstine, Tim Kane

Overview

From 1982 to 2022, John Van Alstine created and installed eighteen large sculptures in the United States and abroad while developing another eighteen proposals that remain unrealized. Although these monumental projects are fewer compared with the over 800 studio works he produced during this 40-year period, they represent a significant part of his career and important contributions to public art that cannot be overlooked.

American Monuments: Finding New Dimensions chronicles this aspect of Van Alstine’s art and highlights the significance of large-scale works in his career. Known primarily for work created in the studio and exhibited in galleries and museums, Van Alstine’s public works reveal a distinct and vital facet of his legacy.

The book delves into a series of works that go beyond what many people typically know about Van Alstine, providing an even more insightful perspective on one of the masters of American sculpture, offering a fresh angle to the previous two books on his life and career, John Van Alstine Sculptures 1971-2018 and American Vistas: The Art and Life of John Van Alstine.

What emerges is an artist who used scale to expand his overall object-making aesthetic. Van Alstine’s art is about engaging, elevating and balancing heavy, earthbound materials like stone and steel, infusing them with a sense of weightlessness and animation. By breathing life into these otherwise inert materials, he tells deeply humanistic stories. On a larger scale, his sculptures radiate energy and intensity, bringing his artistic vision to life.

Product Details

ISBN-13:	9781956370812
Publisher:	Clovercroft Publishing
Publication date:	04/09/2025
Pages:	336
Product dimensions:	11.00(w) x 11.00(h) x 0.00(d)

About the Author

Born upstate New York in 1952, John Van Alstine grew up in the southern Adirondacks Mountains. After attending St. Lawrence University(1970-72), Kent State University(BFA 1974) and Cornell University(MFA 1976) he joined the faculty at the University of Wyoming, Laramie and later the University of Maryland, College Park to teach drawing and sculpture. In 1986 he left teaching and moved to the NYC area to pursue studio work full time. In 1987 he purchased a 19th century industrial complex on the banks of the Sacandaga River and returned to the Adirondacks in upstate New York where he now lives and works in the restored historic structure. Van Alstine’s work has been exhibited widely (including over 50 solo exhibitions) in this country as well as in Europe, Asia and the Middle East. He has completed many major large scale outdoor, site-specific commissions installing a large outdoor work for the 2008 Olympic Park, Beijing; a 35' tall piece for the new Indianapolis Airport; and a 28” high work FUNAMBULIST on the Michigan State Universitycampus in East Lansing in June 2010. ther notable projects include a major outdoor piece for TSINGHUA UNIVERSITY - Beijing, China. He also completed a 30’h outdoor 911–SCULPTURE/MEMORIAL sculpture using World Trade Tower steel remnants dedicated Sept. 11, 2012 in Saratoga Springs, NY. In 2020 his work CATAPULTA, was selected from over 1200 worldwide applicants and was enlarged to 5 meters and installed in the Wuhu, China, sculpture park in 2021. Van Alstine is a recipient of many individual arts grants and fellowships including from the Gottlieb Foundation, the Pollock-Krasner Foundation, the Tiffany Foundation, National Endowment for the Arts and a number of state arts grants. His work is held in many private and public and corporate collections in this country and Europe, Asia and the Middle East.

Editorial Reviews

"John Van Alstine’s public works are monumental in scale, rugged in material, daring in composition, and smart as they are vigorous, in every way.  Those that already have been realized are spectacles; as for those he’s imagined, we can anticipate along with him that they’ll find their places in the world and be enduring testaments to the natural and human forces that have created them."
— Howard N. Fox, independent curator and Emeritus Curator of Contemporary Art, Los Angeles County Museum of Art

"American Monuments: Finding New Dimensions, joins John Van Alstine: Sculptures 1971-2018 and American Vistas: The Art and Life of John Van Alstine to complete a trilogy of books exploring and interpreting the art of this American master of sculpture. His realized and unrealized monumental public works reveal yet another dimension of artistic creativity and exploration. Van Alstine’s artworks integrate intellectual, scientific and mythological themes in seemingly impossible orchestrations of elements. His public large-scale works realize his ultimate dimensionalization of form, material, and message and are a legacy honoring the ancients and stimulating the contemporary. This handsome book by Tim Kane and the artist adds immeasurably to our knowledge of this major American sculptor."
— Caroline M. Welsh, Art Historian and Director Emerita, Adirondack Museum

"Throughout a long and extraordinarily productive career, John Van Alstine has created one of the most significant bodies of sculpture in America.  His studio works have for many decades graced some of the country’s most important museum and personal collections.  Now, in this gorgeous book, his monumental works receive the focused attention they so gloriously deserve."
— Steven Naifeh, Pulitzer Prize-winning author of Jackson Pollock: An American Saga

"With beauty and drama that reflect the works themselves, this book showcases the large-scale creations—both built and unbuilt—of a great American sculptor. But it goes beyond that, making a powerful case for the continued importance, urgency and relevance of monuments in today’s world. Van Alstine offers a thoughtful response to the sentiment of early 19th-century Speaker of the House Nathaniel Macon, who claimed, ‘Monuments are good for nothing.’ As an artist deeply connected to the land, the sky, and all they encompass, Van Alstine inspires us to lift our eyes and hearts, guided by the better angels of our nature."
— William R. Cross, Author of Winslow Homer: American Passage, Chair of the advisory board of the Yale Center for Faith and Culture

"This beautifully illustrated book showcases the impressive large-scale work of Adirondack-based sculptor John Van Alstine. With insightful autobiographical reflections by the artist and crisp commentary by journalist Tim Kane, it highlights Van Alstine’s journey to develop a sculptural language rooted in the forces of nature and gravity. The narrative captures the tension between nature’s vast power and the relentless grind of time, space, and human industry. A must-read for anyone seeking to understand this compelling and unavoidable drama."
— F. David Reif, Prof. Emeritus, Art Dept., University of Wyoming

From the Publisher