RON BARON

Ron Baron was born in Springfield, MA and raised in the suburb Longmeadow. He quit high school at 16 and took a ceramics continuing education class at Baypath Community College where he met his instructor the salt glaze potter David Halsey. Baron began to work with Halsey at the Leverett Arts and Crafts Center, assisting with his work and in the evenings and weekends creating his own. Passionate about salt glaze ceramics Baron went on to study with Don Reitz at the University of Wisconsin in Madison receiving a B.A. in Art. In 1985 Baron pursued his MFA in Ceramics and Sculpture at the University of California, Davis studying with the legend Robert Arneson. While in grad school Baron began to work with accumulations of found ceramic bric-a-brac that he incorporated into his ceramic sculptures.

 

After graduate school in 1988 Baron moved to Brooklyn New York and gained recognition for his “STAX”, a series of vessel like sculptures created from stacked dishes. In 1991 he was awarded an 8 month Lila Wallace Giverny Artist Residency Grant and lived and worked at the Monet Museum and homestead in France. While in residence he toured Europe and North Africa collecting objects that were used in his assemblages. In 1992 he received a National Endowment for the Arts fellowship in Sculpture and in 1997 was awarded a New York Foundation in the Arts grant in Sculpture. Baron has been an artist in residence at Yaddo in upstate New York ten times beginning in 1993 and most recently in 2015 when he was awarded the Louise Bourgeois Endowed Residency. Baron also received a Pollock-Krasner Grant in 2015. For more then two decades he has exhibited his work nationally and internationally in exhibitions at galleries and museums.

 

From 2000-13, Baron focused his major efforts on creating large-scale works for public spaces. He has completed more then 20 Public Art projects and site specific installations. Some of his most prominent works are commissions with the MTA and Long Island Railroad in Hempstead, NY, Indianapolis International Airport, Board of Education NYC, Depart of Cultural Affairs NYC, Alaska International Airport, University of Oregon: Autzen Stadium, the Portland Regional Arts Council and the Department of Cultural Affairs San Jose, CA.

 

Ron Baron currently lives in Williamsburg Brooklyn, NY and teaches Sculpture at the School of Visual Art, NYC.