ARTIST

388words

with Paso Robles-based sculptor Dale Evers

I sold my first sculpture out of a gallery in Cambria 34 years ago. It was a wood-carved blue whale. Since then I’ve sold over 20,000 sculptures—some of them in the six-figures— but I’ve never reached the thrill of that first sale. The feeling I had that day was almost child-like realizing that I had created something that somebody else really valued.

Twenty-five years ago or so I sculpted a table that I called “Dolphin Duet” and I knew it was a winner, so I made a bunch of them. I took an ad out in Architectural Digest, a half-page ad; it cost me everything I had in the bank. I think it was about $10,000 back then. It was just a huge gamble, but it ended up paying off. I sold out of the tables. They just took off.

When I was in Hawaii a praying mantis landed on my shoulder. It looked me square in the eye and with a British accent it said, “Me and my cousins are your future.” So, after being all-in with marine art, I got pulled into insects, which represented a big career change for me. I started studying everything I could about insects. I learned they could eat their body weight in an hour—or something along those lines—it takes me at least three hours to do that. ” I grew up Catholic and I always tripped out on all of the amazing art in church. When I was eight or nine-years-old my father caught me whittling a piece of wood with some steak knives, so he bought me a set of carving tools. My dad kept helping me along with my hobby, and by the time I was twelve, I was doing full-blown busts, like Beethoven, in wood. It was kind of rough, but not bad for a kid.

I think people try to build a lot of hype around their art. They try to say it represents something or another and they get way out on a limb. A majority of artists overcomplicate what is basically a simple process. I think that people like to embellish and wear round glasses and Versace turtlenecks and sip cappuccino and postulate, if you will. I’m not part of that camp.