We’re excited to introduce you to the always interesting and insightful Liza Little. We hope you’ll enjoy our conversation with Liza below.

Liza, thanks for joining us, excited to have you contributing your stories and insights. Do you wish you had waited to pursue your creative career or do you wish you had started sooner?

My career path has not been straightforward at all. There are some days I wish I had started sooner, but I think ultimately every step along the way has given me a lot of perspective and skills that I might not have gained if I went straight into pursuing sculpture. Every experience adds to your creative practice, and I think for me everything happened the way it needed to happen.

Awesome – so before we get into the rest of our questions, can you briefly introduce yourself to our readers.

I am a figurative sculptor based in Queens, NYC. The first sculpture classes I took were in high school. Even though I attended a public school, there was a great variety of art classes. I finished the state graduation requirements early so my senior year I pretty much only took art classes- ceramics, painting, drawing, metal jewelry, AP studio art, photography, and sculpture, and even independent study. We got to do a bronze pour at a nearby college with my first sculpture teacher, Trevor Herceg. That early exposure to sculpture was really important, though I didn’t pursue it again for a while after. I studied at The Art Students League of New York with Barney Hodes for many years, and it was him who helped me realize I was really a sculptor. Then decided to further my education at The New York Academy of Art, with a MFA in Sculpture and minor in Anatomy.
In addition to my studio practice, I support myself financially through teaching sculpture and assisting other artists to produce their work in stone.

My body of work expresses the physicality of the figure using the tactile and optical qualities of sculpture materials. Right now I am working in cast glass, stone, and ceramic. The glass technique I have been exploring the last few years is called pâte de verre, or paste of glass, which uses granules of glass that are fused together in the kiln. I start with a clay model, then cast it in glass. It’s a very versatile and expressive medium. Over two years, I produced a series of portrait masks using pâte de verre. Each mask I changed the way the glass was layered into the sculpture mold, so the final result produced a lot of variation between faces. What I like most about the series is seeing them displayed together, where the collective impact is so much greater than any individual mask shown by itself.
My most recent figurative work centers on showcasing the strength and tenderness of women supporting women. I think of myself as a body positive sculptor.

Do you think there is something that non-creatives might struggle to understand about your journey as a creative? Maybe you can shed some light?

I see every part of my education and experience as interconnected, although they may seem disparate. I think having a wide variety of interests is really important for artists and people in general. From dance to psychology and biology to sculpture, I feel like I am cultivating a unique perspective and will be able to make meaningful work. What bothers me is when non-creatives see this as job hopping or being indecisive. Finding connections between disciplines is such a rich area for exploration.

What’s a lesson you had to unlearn and what’s the backstory?

I had to unlearn, and am still trying to unlearn, the impulse to not be seen until I feel ready or good enough. When I was younger and trying to pursue dance, I kind of sabotaged my career by not just putting myself out there. I would think oh I need to be in better shape before I go to that audition.. I need to improve my technique before I am good enough to try out for this gig.. and I didn’t understand that my own perfectionism was standing in the way of getting what I really wanted. I feel like with sculpture it is a little easier for me to just make the work and put it out there without being so guarded. I might still have doubts, but there is always a little part of me that says ‘just try and see what happens’. Unlearning the habit of waiting to be good enough has helped me move forward.

Contact Info:

• Website: lizagracelittlesculpture.com
• Instagram: @lizagracelittle_sculptor

Image Credits
Liza Little