National Sculpture Society is awarding the 2021 Stanley Bleifeld Memorial Grant to Steven Whyte. The Grant is awarded to a sculptor with outstanding ability who has created a body of work inspired by nature which includes works of sculpture in bas-relief and in the round. NSS Fellows Tom Silveroli, Meredith Bergmann and Jim Licaretz served as this year’s jurors.

Bergmann says that, “Whyte’s body of work, from bas-relief portraits to monuments, is accomplished and impressive, and like Stanley Bleifeld’s, conveys the sculptor’s love for his medium and explores the ways sculpture can contribute to public understanding and compassion.”

Whyte studied under Professor Colin Melbourne ARCA and Dame Elizabeth Frink RA at the Sir Henry Doulton School of Sculpture in Staffordshire, England. He went on to teach at Stafford College, where he co-wrote the first validated figurative sculpture course in the United Kingdom. In 2000, he relocated to the United States and soon after founded the Steven Whyte Sculpture Studios in Carmel, California. Whyte has since completed forty-three life-size or larger public bronze figures including the War Hymn Monument for Texas A&M University (College Station, TX). His latest figure is of Joseph Allen Vaugh, the first African American to attend Furman University (Greenville, SC).

Stanley Bleifeld (1924-2011) was a Member Emeritus of the National Sculpture Society and served as president from 1991-1994. The Grant was made possible through a generous donation from his widow, Naomi Bleifeld, and will be awarded annually in perpetuity. It consists of a $5000 cash award and a quarter-page ad in Sculpture Review magazine.