Rick Rothrock: Carved In Stone

Rick Rothrock was born into a two-generation family of manufacturing silversmiths, which indelibly marked him with the knowledge of tools, craft, material, and technology. Stone has been the primary material featured in his work for decades. His work contrasts the natural surface and structure of stone with its internal traces of morphology, genesis, and hidden beauty. The abstraction reveals the physical and visual phenomena that exist in nature rather than represent fauna and flora. The fact that frozen fluid motion appears as wind in a sail or that light can be captured in crystals of matter that appear to be opaque, reveals something fundamental about the invisible forces of nature that effect us all. Many of the artworks are monolithic yet have compositions relying on multiple relationships of material, form, light, color, texture, balance and movement. With its vocabulary of geometry and composition, his artwork is intended to be a poetic description of the physical realm of nature and our connection to it.

Rothrock is a resident of the Village of Arden in Delaware, but his public art installations are on display throughout the Delaware Valley and the country. His work is represented in the collections of museums, several corporations and numerous private collections.

Friday Arts had the opportunity to visit and talk with Rick in his home studio, surrounded by the things he loves in nature. We also followed him to three Delaware sights to experience three very different public installations that are encouraging relationships between people, sculpture, and the natural physical world.

Web Extra: Artists of Arden

Friday Arts intern, Diamond Holland, visits Arden Delaware to find out what makes the town so appealing to the many artists that live there.