About Candyce Garrett
Over her 50 year career, Candyce Garrett has become famous for her monumental granite works found in private, corporate, and museum collections, and in public art installations.
Her sculptures are a fusion of traditional craftsmanship and contemporary design, often abstractly capturing and communicating the essence of the human experience and the beauty of nature.
You can learn more about Candyce's education, exhibitions, and collections by visiting her resumé page.
The renowned sculptor Jesús Moroles, Candyce's mentor and teacher.
Candyce Jones Garrett is a maverick. A visionary. A dreamer. And the world’s preeminent female monumental granite sculptor.
A child of the 60's, Candyce was once arrested for her art. Former Hustler Magazine founder Larry Flynt contacted her to congratulate her unwillingness to compromise and be censored. After nearly four decades of carving, one thing has remained unchanged: Candyce is true to her art and to herself.
With ranching in her family and creativity in her blood, the desert Southwest is now her backdrop. With her feet firmly planted in the dusty New Mexico soil and the vast skies above her, her mind soars as she conceives the kind of abstract and figurative art that allows people to “feel” and interpret within their own parameters. Her works evolve, becoming something more with age. Much like their creator, her sculptures have profound depth and intensity, each a reflection of her dedication to pushing the boundaries of the art form and creating timeless pieces that inspire and provoke thought.
Although she's experienced in a multitude of sculpting mediums – clay, wood, limestone, and marble – Candyce now prefers the challenges offered by granite. Granite is forceful, demanding both passion and precision. It requires commitment, working you at the same time you are working it. Candyce thrives on that give and take.
As an apprentice to the renowned sculptor Jesús Moroles, Candyce quickly grew to stand out amongst those in the art world. Applying what she learned to what she felt, her art has a quality that is sought by private collectors and for public display; a testament to an artist whose works have universal appeal.
WITH GRATITUDE
It’s not just the rustic, expansive grandeur of the desert southwest that inspires works like "Heart and Soul", "Replenishing the Earth", "Emergence", and "XO", nor is it just the creative energy permeating from an artist colony like Taos, New Mexico. Special people in Candyce’s life have contributed to all that is her.
Jesús Moroles, Luis Jiménez, and Emily Benoist Ruffin have all had impact on Candyce’s life and art, though each for different reasons and during different seasons of her life. One was a teacher, one was a critic, and one was a prominent goldsmith. Candyce was gifted something invaluable from each of them and it all culminates, ferments, and is reborn in what she creates today.