Ralph Hurst Sold at Auction Prices

b. 1918 - d. 2003

Ralph N. Hurst September 4, 1918 - December 7, 2003

Since his first major competitive exhibition "American Sculpture 1951" at the Metropolitan Museum of Art and "Art USA: '58" at Madison Square Garden in New York, Ralph Hurst continued, in the words of Patricia Boyd Wilson of The Christian Science Monitor in April 1973, to stand preeminent among sculptors in the United States." Painter, ceramist, designer, architect, and most notably, sculptor, Hurst traversed the art range. From portraiture to photography, from Museum curator of the Ogunquit, Maine Museum of Art, to art educator, from architectural bas-reliefs at Florida State University to interior and portrait bas-reliefs, and his plethora of three-dimensional carvings of figures, birds, animals, and fish, he has archival documentation of thousands of works. Exhibiting from Main to California, one-man exhibitions and galleries from coast to coast, Hurst enjoyed thousands of collectors, both corporate and private, all over the United States, Canada, and Europe who enjoy the beauty and tactile pleasure of his art.

Born in Decatur, Indiana, Hurst earned his undergraduate and graduate work in art from Indiana University. In 1953, he migrated to Miami, Florida, where he was discovered and lured to Florida State University to become a member of the art faculty of 27 years. Professor Emeritus Hurst remembers fondly his teaching experience in ceramics, constructive design, woodworking, synthetics, supervising art education majors and teaching elementary art education teachers on campus as well as several years of in- service art classes to teachers in kindergarten and elementary classes in Dade, Palm Beach, and Escambia counties. Highlighting his Florida State University career was receiving three faculty grants, one of which provided the opportunity to have a studio in Florence, Italy carving in alabaster and marble. February 15-March 24, 2002 Florida State University honored Hurst with a retrospective of his fifty plus years as an artist by staging in the Museum of Fine Arts examples of his works in wood, marble, alabaster, bronze, steatite, ceramics, paint, and synthetics, celebrating the many artistic and life time achievements of his much loved, honored, and award winning works. Because his work simplifies, abstracts, many of his pieces negate detail by tucking close (as to be one) the arms, feet, or other anatomical parts. Hurst's strength as a sculptor is strong repetition of rhythmic carving graceful lines reminiscent of the classics. Called a poet in stone, Hurst devoted his creative life to art that gained him recognition from Maine to California. Though best known for his elegant and sensuous alabaster carvings of figures and love birds, Hurst was a multimedia artist who found great joy in the creative process. Said Hurst, "In the hours of creativity when I engage in shaping boulders into form and the form becomes alive and a thing of beauty, my spirit soars."

In September 2003, the Hursts, Ralph and his wife Jean, established the Ralph and Jean Hurst Collection with Tallahassee Community College through donation of artwork of substantial value. The Ralph Hurst Gallery was cut out of a space next to the performing arts theatre co-designed by Jean Hurst founding theatre director and English professor at Tallahassee Community College from 1969-2000. On perpetual exhibition, the collection of their art not only allows them to share creativity with students and faculty of the College campus but with the entire community and perhaps impart some of their enthusiasm for art as well as inspire and teach others to appreciate art.