Butterfly Weed, 2023
David Boyajian
New Fairfield, CT
Steel
120” x 72” x 60”
Photos by Kyla Willoughby
Artist Statement
Regardless of what materials I use or what form my sculptures take – be they volumetric, concave / convex, linear or plainer, forged, fabricated, or carved – I deal with the same poetic perceptions.My work centers around images that relate to man/woman’s relationship to their physical environment. I often begin with an architectural element such as a gate, column or window symbolizing passage and transformation as it relates to the journey of life. My shapes often define a narrative or metaphor by juxtaposing images from nature against the use of industrial materials within the architectural environment. My themes are based on observations of nurturing, regeneration, and growth, as well as poetic concepts relating to community, tolerance, and acceptance.
About the Artist
David Boyajian is an artist, art instructor, and the owner of David Boyajian Sculpture Studio in New Fairfield, Connecticut. In the early 1980s, Boyajian studied at Alfred University, the Skowhegan School of Painting and Sculpture, and earned his MFA from the Maryland Institute Rinehart School of Sculpture. Following his fine art education, Boyajian continued his studies while assisting figurative sculptors Wolfgang Behl, Elbert Weinberg, and Andrew Coppola. Over the course of his thirty-plus-year career, Boyajian has shown his work in numerous solo and group exhibitions, including SculptureNow on The Mount, Edith Wharton’s home in Lenox, Massachusetts, Bull City Sculpture Show in Durham, North Carolina, and ‘Genesis,’ an outdoor solo show at the Robert Moses Sculpture Garden at Fordham University.
Boyajian’s numerous public commissions include “The Weaving Shuttle” and “The Eye of the Needle” at the Mansfield Town Square in Mansfield, Connecticut, “Lift,” a memorial to a former student at the Canterbury School in New Milford, and “Sanctuary” at the 9/11 Living Memorial at Sherwood Island for the state of Connecticut. His teaching career has spanned over twenty years at institutions such as Western Connecticut State University, Silvermine School of Art, and Hartford Art School at the University of Hartford.