To Purchase Sculpture

With the sculpture of Barry Woods Johnston, inevitably there will be one work or two that draws each viewer back for another look. Some may quietly meditate before a favorite piece while others restlessly circle seeking another vantage point or subtle change of perspective. This is the magic of great art — it rewards repeated viewing with some additional wisdom, truth, or beauty.

Visitors in the next century will stand transfixed at the entrance to Lafayette Center in Washington, D.C., as they have done since Johnston’s Wedlock (Visit our Commissions Gallery) was first unveiled, awed by the timeless beauty, the soaring physical perfection suspended above them in weightless grace. Business and civic leaders who see Johnston’s architectural sculpture and public monuments will be inspired by the foresight of their predecessors and their manifest ideals. Museums will see the popularity of his work grow as time affirms each acquisition.

A fortunate few will treasure private ownership of his work — the beguiling Temperance (Featured Works Gallery) or the Dolphin Boys (Mythological Themes) or King Lear (Shakespeare Series) — as a rich legacy, a cherished heirloom that serves as tangible link from ancestor to descendant. To caress a bronze sculpture that was selected, held, and admired long ago by another is as close as we get to touch the soul of someone from the past. It is made of excellence, ideas, faith, emotion, and life experience — the essence of enduring value in art. True virtuosity marshals all the forces at the creator’s command — technique, belief, structure, balance, theme, storytelling, sentiment, movement and gesture — to inspire the human soul.

Steve Mirabella, Art Critic