Craig Kraft
My work is about the process of making art inspired by hidden, forgotten marks, or peripheral glimpses of fleeting light. Since 1983, the common thread of my work has been neon light. I am interested in light itself, whether used as a glowing line, a volume or as a metaphor. Light is inherently contradictory: tangible yet intangible, substantial yet ephemeral. Emitted light pulls the viewer into the artwork; it is, after all, how we see. Constantly in flux, it begs questions of perception and importance, an apt tool for exploring and illuminating the unfamiliar. The work must be original yet at the same time reflect and relate to its surroundings.
I have created sculptural artwork for the past 35 years and public artwork for the past 17 years. Over eighteen works have been sited/commissioned by such entities as The Rhode Island School of Design; Socrates Sculpture Park in Long Island City, New York; Montgomery County, Maryland; The District of Columbia Arts and Humanities Commission; St. Petersburg, Florida Fine Art Museum; Arlington Art Center, Arlington, Virginia; The Cell, New York City; Honfleur Gallery in Anacostia DC; Embassy Suites Hotel, North Carolina and Colorado; International sculpture exhibitions in the Busan, Korea Biennale, and the Museum of Contemporary Art in Merida, Mexico, and most recently Vivace for the Watha T. Daniel Library and the Anacostia Gateway in Washington D.C. I have taught neon light sculpture at the Smithsonian Resident Associates Studio Arts Program for the past 24 years and received three NEA, DCCAH visual arts grants.
