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Fantastical Wooden Sculptures Act as Symbols of Compassion


In his personal sculpture garden, Australian artist Bruno Torfs crafts wooden figures that live in the forest. Embracing fantasy, his life-sized works feature delightfully unusual characters. We see things like a bearded wizard carrying an armful of tiny creatures and a young princess riding a unicorn. Torfs incorporates the natural landscape into his art, using tree branches and leaves as a part of his subjects' hair or body. After carving, they remain unpainted and blend in with their surroundings.

We might describe someone as wooden when they lack emotion, but Torfs proves that wood can convey an incredible range of feelings. He communicates love, joy, and sadness through tiny details like the angle of a shoulder or subtle shape of an eye. These figures mirror difficult emotions we face, and his work is a symbol of compassion and a source of comfort to those who use nature walks for reflection.

Torfs' travels inspired his sculptures. At the beginning of his career, he would return from a trip and sketch and paint the people he met. His work became so popular that he and his family moved from Europe to Australia to open Bruno's Art and Sculpture Garden, where it is on permanent display. Now, visitors from around the world can walk through the rainforest and experience the handcrafted magic.











Bruno's Art and Sculpture Garden website
via [Vielleicht and Sculptures of the Blue Planet]

Sara Barnes

Sara Barnes is a Staff Editor at My Modern Met, Manager of My Modern Met Store, and co-host of the My Modern Met Top Artist Podcast. As an illustrator and writer living in Seattle, she chronicles illustration, embroidery, and beyond through her blog Brown Paper Bag and Instagram @brwnpaperbag. She wrote a book about embroidery artist Sarah K. Benning titled "Embroidered Life" that was published by Chronicle Books in 2019. Sara is a graduate of the Maryland Institute College of Art. She earned her BFA in Illustration in 2008 and MFA in Illustration Practice in 2013.
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