The Bell Keepers

By Bruce Papitto, Installed 2010

The Bell Ringers sculpture

I began making figure sculpture 25 years ago and have a large and still growing body of work. My figure sculptures are about bonds… to each other, to ideals… and about protection. The figures are usually in action. The physical motion gives the sculptures an aliveness and lends an urgency to what I am trying to communicate.

I’ve also created 3 large-scale public sculptures in bronze. A nine foot tall Revolutionary War Minuteman, “The Patriot”, in Bedford, Massachusetts is racing toward the battle at the Concord Bridge carrying the Bedford Flag; my “U.S. Senator John Chafee” portrait-figure strides towards the Narragansett Bay in the park he created in Bristol, Rhode Island; the first casting of “The Bell Keepers” leans into a storm in Alameda, New Mexico while a second casting has made its way into the collection of Benson Sculpture Garden in Loveland, Colorado.