STEVE TOBIN

Steve Tobin is an American sculptor best known for his monumental sculptures of roots made of steel and cast bronze. Trained in mathematics, Tobin has always pushed the physical boundaries of the sculptural materials he chooses to work with.

He has made blown glass pieces too tall to stand on their own (but managed to devise a solution). He has created 40’ tall glass waterfalls; constructed huge clay sculptures which explode, revealing geode-like brightly colored glass interiors. Each time Tobin has reinvented himself, he has turned to nature for inspiration.

From taking molds of giant termite hills in Ghana, cast into bronze sculptures as high as 20’, or from the forest floors to make his Earth Bronze series. Tobin's monumental Steel root sculptures fabricated from large industrial steel pipes with painstakingly welded joints, explore the archetypal relationship between humans and nature.

More recently, Tobin has created a series of highly reflective stainless steel clouds, bringing the sky down to earth. Another series, Tobin has created bird nests in a multitude of sizes, from miniature to monumental, in cast bronze or welded steel, that hold precious eggs made of stainless steel or bronze: a metaphor for the seed of life.

Artist Statement

"The Steel Roots series is a natural evolution of my Earth Bronzes series. In moving from bronze to steel I have moved from naturalist to the modernist tradition. The metaphor of roots remains the same as with the bronze, but by taking direct from life casting out and replacing it with formed steel, the pieces are much more alive, animated. The roots evoke communities, families, unseen power, networks all coming together for a shared purpose. They gather energy and send it upward in support of the “tree” that is not visually apparent.

The curvilinear geometries between the roots, frame the view creating landscapes in the negative spaces that ebb and flow as the viewer moves around and under the piece. The legs are anthropomorphic, suggesting images of people dancing or huddling together in embrace and collusion. They create a sense of gathering. Juxtaposed with the buildings of San Francisco they will be fantastic organic root gods protecting and animating the space they occupy as well as the spaces viewed in between and around the sculpture.

This follows my previous public exhibition in New York, in which the juxtaposition of insect architecture, i.e. my bronze African Termite Mounds, against the magnificent backdrop of the American Museum of Natural History, and the suggestion of frantic activity in their simultaneous placement at the mouth of a subway station in Montefiore Park in Harlem (termites scurrying about in an orderly fashion in their hive vs. subway riders underground), evokes feelings of humanity’s connection with the natural world."