Patrick Dougherty James Florio: Sticks

Patrick Dougherty (b. 1945) was born in Oklahoma and raised in North Carolina. He earned a B.A. in English from the University of North Carolina in 1967 and an M.A. in Hospital and Health Administration from the University of Iowa in 1969. Later, he returned to the University of North Carolina to study art history and sculpture.

Combining his carpentry skills with his love of nature, Patrick began to learn more about primitive techniques of building and to experiment with tree saplings as construction material. In 1982 his first work, Maple Body Wrap, was included in the North Carolina Biennial Artists’ Exhibition, sponsored by the North Carolina Museum of Art. In the following year, he had his first one-person show entitled, Waitin’ It Out in Maple at the Southeastern Center for Contemporary Art in Winston-Salem, North Carolina.

His work quickly evolved from single pieces on conventional pedestals to monumental scale environmental works, which required saplings by the truckloads. Over the last thirty-some years, he has built over 300 of these works, and become internationally acclaimed. His sculpture has been seen worldwide---from Scotland to Japan to Brussels, and all over the United States.

He has received numerous awards, including the 2011 Factor Prize for Southern Art, North Carolina Artist Fellowship Award, Pollock-Krasner Foundation Grant, Henry Moore Foundation Fellowship, Japan-US Creative Arts Fellowship, and National Endowment for the Arts Fellowship. 

James Florio is a Montana-based photographer focused on the built environment and the life surrounding it. He works slowly whenever possible, visiting a place repeatedly to gain a greater understanding of it and to deliver a thoughtful and profound interpretation. He is currently working on several long-term projects documenting the unique changes of nature, climate, and time on architecture and landscapes. Using the camera as a means to investigate, understand, and document, working both with digital and film, he prefers to work with medium or large format film for its depth and deliberation.

You can see more of his work in various publications and books, including the recent Mas Context project; Radical Logic, On the Work of Ensamble Studio, Gio Ponti in the American West, Divisare Books; National Geographic Traveler; Domus; Architect Magazine; Architectural Record; Modern in Denver; and others.

He was recently awarded the 2022 Julius Shulman Institute Excellence in Photography Award.