Jimmy Descant was in full storyteller mode Saturday, coffee cup in hand, as visitors paused to take in the gleaming, gear-laden sculptures beside him. Before launching his art career, the self-taught artist from Tucson, Ariz., spent 15 years as a roadie for bands including Motorhead, R.E.M. and the Indigo Girls. Today he builds his pieces from salvaged industrial and machine parts, a style he calls “severe reconstructivism of Western futurism.”
“I was always mechanical and artistic,” he said. “I started building rocket ships from old vacuum cleaners in the front yard, but I didn’t call myself an artist for a few years. Then I started making things with a deliberate statement and reason, showing what the American manufacturing and manifest destiny did to decimate the tribes of Native Americans.”
Descant’s pieces were just a few out of more than 2,000 sculptures filling five large tents in Loveland’s Benson Park for the 41st annual Sculpture in the Park.
The nation’s largest outdoor juried sculpture show, Sculpture in the Park brought 168 artists from across the country to Loveland this weekend, including 33 first-time exhibitors such as Descant. Hosted by the High Plains Arts Council (HPAC), the two-day event draws thousands of visitors and generates about $1.5 million in art sales and ticket revenue each year, with proceeds funding new public art and improvements to the park.
HPAC Executive Director Jade Windell, who also had his artwork on display, said the show’s longevity has as much to do with its people as its art…