Out of the Mold: A Sculptor’s Life Lawrence Nowlan Didn’t Follow Usual Route to His Art Rebecca Denton – Valley News – August 12, 1999 Windsor Sculptor Lawrence Nowlan worked quietly in his muggy Windsor studio recently, the combined hum of the fan and radio muting the sounds of traffic rumbling by on the street. He shaped the small lump of clay in his hands, creating a sculpture of two nude forms wrapped in a passionate embrace. “On a lot of these things, I don’t start with an idea in mind,” he said, wiping sweat from his brow. “I start pushing clay around, and it leads to what it is. I just let the forms take shape.” Nowlan’s art career has evolved in much the same way, emerging gradually without a long-term plan. His classically-designed sculptures of the human figure have won a number of commissions and awards that often elude more established artists: a three-year residency at Saint-Gaudens National Historic Site in Cornish (completed in 1997), a commission, and a commission for a larger-than-life bronze depiction of firefighters for a memorial in Boise, Idaho, to be unveiled in November. By any artistic measure, Nowlan, 34, is doing well. Considering he first picked up clay six years ago, however, his progress is astounding. In the early ‘90’s, Nowlan was successfully by most people’s standards. Earning a substantial salary as an art director and graphic designer for a Philadelphia advertising agency, he could afford the essentials: a nice apartment and season tickets to Flyers’ hockey games. But he wasn’t happy: “I was a microcosm of a guy who has everything and was miserable,” he said. Seeking a more hands-on approach to art, he enrolled in a night class in sculpture at the nearby Philadelphia Academy of Fine Arts. After Nowlan created his second sculpture in the class, the instructor – surprised to learn that Nowlan had no previous sculpture experience – said that his work was better then the other students’, most of whom had sculpted for years. The teacher encouraged him to pursue the art in graduate school. Using photos of sculptures from his night class, Nowlan applied to the prestigious New York Academy of Art. He was accepted along with 10 other candidates, five of whom were from Europe. Unlike the other students, though, who had years of art training and were well-versed in art history, Nowlan was what he calls “a Joe Schmo.” “I could talk sports and stuff,” he said recently, perched on a stool in his studio, “but not art…(Other students) would be name-dropping and everyone had airs on, and I had no clue. I couldn’t even pretend to have airs. I was like a deer in the headlight.” Raised in a blue-collar, Irish-Catholic family with six other children in the suburbs of Philadelphia, Nowlan had little exposure to art while growing up. “You follow your examples,” he said. “My examples were just working – you get a job and you do it. I knew no artists, so obviously it wasn’t in the forefront of my mind.” He worked a varity of jobs throughout the years: landscaping and maintenance, moving furniture, cooking at a resturatn. Nowlan also studed art in college, but he lacked focus as an undergraduate. His main goal was to get the degree and make his parents proud. “I grew up with regular, everyday working people,” he said. “I was overwhelmed in Manhattan (at graduate school). I didn’t know anybody. I thought, “Oh man, what am I doing here?” When it came time to sculpt, however, Nowlan could more than his own. He spent much of his spare time in the studio, completing the sculptures required for class along with dozens that were not. Instead of socializing at night, he stayed in his apartment, seeking and filling out applications for scholarships, commissions and grants through the Internet and books. As an “ordinary” guy immersed in the unfamiliar, competitive culture of art school, Nowlan could have struggled. Instead, he thrived – personally and professionally. He was voted class representative the first year, and chosen for the national residency at Saint-Gaudens National Historic Site in Cornish that summer. Nowlan’s laid-back nature broke down barriers of pretension among students, said Brian Kramer, a sculptor in Virginia who went to graduate school with him. “It takes someone like (Nowlan), by his example and his enthusiasm, to turn a hotbed of competitiveness into a place where sculptures students share ideas, as well as share the many physical labors involved in producing figurative sculpture,” Kramer said. “The thing that stands out in my mind about him is his consistency of sincerity in both his sculpture and his life.” That approach helped Nowlan land the Saint-Gaudens residency, said Gregory Schwartz, chief of interpretation and visitor services for the site. At Saint-Gaudens, the sculptor often interact with visitors, who wander in the studio and ask questions. “He’s a naturally grefarious person, and he also knows and really enjoys his work,” Schwartz said. “That comes through when dealing with the public. When we find sculptors like that, it’s wonderful for us.” Through the Saint-Gaudens residency, Nowlan met Frank Derrick of Hanover, who was searaching for someone to create a bronze sculpture for the Ray Elementary School in for the Ray Elementary in memory of his wife, Louise. Derrick – who lliked the natural look of Nowlan’s work – recommended him to the memorial fund committee, and Nowlan was awarded a commission to create the likeness of a child reading a book. “(the finished sculpture) expressed what was in the committee’s mind just the way they seemed to have seen it,” Derrick said. “We were just thrilled with it.”