User:Nicashmc/sandbox

Brian R. Owens (born in Detroit, 1958) is a second-generation artist: a realistic sculptor and painter, based in central Florida, best known for bronze figurative sculpture and more recently, for oil portraiture and monumental bronze sculpture.

Career
Owens' art education began in childhood as he was encouraged to develop basic skills by his father, the late Carl Owens, an illustrator who established his career in Detroit. Educated as an electrical engineer, Owens worked for nearly a decade in this field. During this time he relocated to Florida and resumed his informal art education through non-matriculated classes, private instruction and self-styled apprenticeships. Owens' career as a full-time professional artist began in his early thirties in 1991 followed by the release of his first body of work: Small bronze figurative sculptures, mostly limited to museum editions, cast at his studio foundry. Owens' emerging art career was concurrent with the birth of an expanding market for "Black Art" in major cities such as Atlanta, Georgia in the early 1990’s. This was part of a national trend; a period of increased opportunities for African American artists fueled largely by swelling numbers of African American professionals who emerged as art collectors. Owens gradually moved away from the creation of art for sale on a speculative basis by galleries to pursue fine art commissions while continuing his education. He has won six competitive individual grants for visual artists and numerous private and public sculpture commissions, the most notable being his St. Augustine Foot Soldiers Monument located in St. Augustine, Florida.

Awards
Portrait Society of America - Members Only Competition, “First Merit” Award, 2013

The Florida Historical Society, David C Brotemarkle Award, 2012

Creative Capital Foundation, Advanced Workshop, 2012

Portrait Society of America - Art of the Portrait Conference Scholarship, 2009

Creative Capital Foundation, Professional Development Program, 2008

The George Sugarman Foundation Grant, 2006

Volusia County Individual Artist Professional Development Grant, 2006-2007

Florida Artist Enhancement Grant, 2006-2007

Florida Artist Enhancement Grant, 2005-2006

New Forms Florida Program grant, 1996

New Forms Florida Program grant, 1994

Winner - Best of Show, Museum of African American Art, Tampa, Florida, 1992

Selected Commissions
Dr. Author Herold Parker Monument, for Birmingham Board of Education, Birmingham, AL, for A. H. Parker High School, 2013.

St. Augustine Foot Soldiers Monument, for St. Augustine Foot Soldiers Remembrance Project, Inc., 2011

Bronze bust of Robert W. Saunders for Robert W. Saunders Public Library Foundation, Inc., Tampa FL, 2011

Bronze bust of Thomas H. (T.H.) Poole, Sr., on 10-year exhibit at Lake County Historical Museum, Tavares, Florida, 2007

Bronze portrait of Dr. Larry R. Handfield, for Bethune-Cookman University, Daytona Beach, Florida, Mar. 2006

Bronze portrait of Zora Neale Hurston for African American Museum of the Arts, DeLand, Florida, 2003

DeBary Library, Volusia County, Florida, 1999

Corporation for Olympic Development in Atlanta (CODA), 1996

Public Art, bonded bronze, for Volusia County, at Deltona Regional Library, DeBary, Florida, Jan. 1996

Art Periodicals, where Referenced
Journal of the Portrait Society of America, Issue No. 62, Member News

Journal of the Portrait Society of America, Issue No. 55, Member News

Journal of the Portrait Society of America, Issue No. 52, Member News

Journal of the Portrait Society of America, Issue No. 49, Member News

Journal of the Portrait Society of America, Issue No. 45, Member News

Journal of the Portrait Society of America, Issue No. 39, Member News

Art in America, March 2007

The International Review of African American Art, Volume 17, Number 1

Orlando Arts Magazine, Feb-March 1999