Biography
Snelson was born in Pendleton, Oregon in 1927. He studied at the University of Oregon in Eugene, at the Black Mountain College, and with Fernand Léger in Paris. His sculpture and photography have been exhibited at over 25 one-man shows in galleries around the world including the structurally seminal Park Place Gallery in New York in the 1960s. Snelson has also done research on the shape of the atom. Snelson continues to work in his SoHo studio, occasionally collaborating with animator Jonathan Monaghan. He lives in New York City with his wife, Katherine.
He holds four United States patents: #3,169,611: Discontinuous Compression Structures, February, 1965; #3,276,148: Model for Atomic Forms, October, 1966; #4,099,339: Model for Atomic Forms, July, 1978; and #6,017,220: Magnetic Geometric Building System; and most recently, #6,739,937: Space Frame Structure Made by 3-D Weaving of Rod Members, May 25, 2004.
Snelson was a founding member of ConStruct, the artist-owned gallery that promoted and organized large-scale sculpture exhibitions throughout the United States. Other founding members include Mark di Suvero, John Raymond Henry, Lyman Kipp and Charles Ginnever.
Snelson has been selected to work with Skidmore, Owings and Merrill, on the design of an antenna for the new Freedom Tower.
Read more about this topic: Kenneth Snelson
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