Bret Price

Bret Price received his MFA in ceramics from the California Institute of the Arts in 1975, and within the year he began teaching at Chapman University in Orange, California. Daydreaming during a staff meeting one day, he had the idea to apply intense heat to steel to soften and manipulate the material in a similar fashion as clay. He made his first metal sculpture in 1979 for a new athletic facility at the university. This method of making allows Price to sculpt on a large scale, and he has created pieces up to thirty-four feet tall and weighing several tons. He wrote that he likes how his finished sculptures become visual records of the process of their creation. (Jay Boylan, Illusion of Flexibility; Dialogue with Doti & Dodge, artist interview by Chapman University, Dodge College of Film and Media Arts, 18 July 2010)