Wired Sculpture Studios

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Duncan uses sinuous curving line to animate his abstract portraits and figurative work, pulling inspiration from modern and contemporary art as well as street, craft, and outsider art.

I do a lot of holding in-process work up against the sky to create a silhouette; this helps me envision how the work wil...
02/01/2026

I do a lot of holding in-process work up against the sky to create a silhouette; this helps me envision how the work will look when powder coated a uniform color, as well as better identify any problem areas that need to be addressed. But mostly I like doing it because I love how it looks!

So much of the work is about negative space, and being sculptural I prefer to leave work unframed, allowing the environment to fill in the lines. While most of my work ends up installed on walls, I love these moments in the studio where I it feels not just like I’m drawing through air, but drawing on the sky.

I do a lot of holding in-process work up against the sky to create a silhouette; this helps me envision how the work wil...
02/01/2026

I do a lot of holding in-process work up against the sky to create a silhouette; this helps me envision how the work will look when powder coated a uniform color, as well as better identify any problem areas that need to be addressed.

So much of the work is about negative space, and being sculptural I prefer to leave work unframed, allowing the environment to fill in the lines. While most of my work ends up installed on walls, I love these moments in the studio where I it feels not just like I’m drawing through air, but drawing on the sky.

I enjoy watching people photograph my work at shows and fairs - how they choose the angle, the cropping. It’s a view int...
01/30/2026

I enjoy watching people photograph my work at shows and fairs - how they choose the angle, the cropping. It’s a view into their own artistic vision and tastes.

Documentation is both fun, and important way to catalog memories for later reference. However, studies have shown that documentation gets in the way of memory formation - we have more trouble recalling details about subjects we photograph when compared to those we have observed with intention.

Some of my favorite works of art date from when I worked as a Visitor’s Assistant at the ICA in Boston. During slow periods, I would spend large chunks of time sitting with particular works, just observing them, being with them. This helped me create unique spotlight talks based not just upon the history of the work and its context within the broader cultural narrative of art history, but on the aspects I found personally powerful.

Document, yes, but don’t let that get in the way of observing work. Of just being with it.

Working with 3/4 life size figures again has me thinking about these two pieces from early 2023 from the Pandemic. Like ...
01/28/2026

Working with 3/4 life size figures again has me thinking about these two pieces from early 2023 from the Pandemic. Like many of us, I struggled during that time - depression, isolation, anxiety. The feeling of being trapped, in a holding pattern, waiting as what was supposed to be weeks became months became just “life.” These works were part of a way to capture what I and many others felt during that time - the quotes came from friends.

It’s nice to see that while I’m returning to a similar format, the works I’m creating right now are much more fun and free (although the poses are pulling from my anxious sitter series, because hey there’s still a lot to be anxious about these days).

Hi everyone! I’m bringing my wire portraiture + contour drawing workshop to on Sunday, Feb 15th! I’m super excited to b...
01/20/2026

Hi everyone! I’m bringing my wire portraiture + contour drawing workshop to on Sunday, Feb 15th! I’m super excited to be hosting a workshop right here in downtown Oakland. Here’s the class blurb:

“Come join us for a creative afternoon exploring the art of contour drawing and wire sculpture with artist Duncan Sherwood-Forbes!

The workshop will begin with instruction and exercises in blind contour drawing, learning how to let the eye guide the hand and navigate the subject in a single line. You will have the option of drawing your peers or objects, and after a series of blind contours we will refine your favorites into contour drawings with thought and intention, which will serve as inspiration for your wire sculpture!

At the end of the workshop, you will leave with multiple contour drawings as well as at least one wire sculpture, and a whole host of new skills! Whether you have no experience and are looking for a fun event to do with friends, or you are a seasoned artist seeking new skills, this workshop offers a welcoming and supportive environment to nurture your creativity.

This workshop is appropriate for artists of all levels who are interested in contour drawing or wire sculpture.

ALL MATERIALS ARE INCLUDED

Drawing boards, paper, pencils, wire, and pliers will all be provided, but feel free to bring your own materials.”

Fee: $135. Link in profile to sign up!

Hi everyone, I’m bringing my wire portraiture + contour drawing workshop to in downtown Oakland! It will be tons of fun...
01/19/2026

Hi everyone, I’m bringing my wire portraiture + contour drawing workshop to in downtown Oakland! It will be tons of fun, as you can see from the photos of my previous workshops. Link to buy tickets in my bio.

Here’s a little info about the class:

“Come join us for a creative afternoon exploring the art of contour drawing and wire sculpture with artist Duncan Sherwood-Forbes!

The workshop will begin with instruction and exercises in blind contour drawing, learning how to let the eye guide the hand and navigate the subject in a single line. You will have the option of drawing your peers or objects, and after a series of blind contours we will refine your favorites into contour drawings with thought and intention, which will serve as inspiration for your wire sculpture! At the end of the workshop, you will leave with multiple contour drawings as well as at least one wire sculpture, and a whole host of new skills!

Whether you have no experience and are looking for a fun event to do with friends, or you are a seasoned artist seeking new skills, this workshop offers a welcoming and supportive environment to nurture your creativity. This workshop is appropriate for artists of all levels who are interested in contour drawing or wire sculpture.

Fee: $135

ALL MATERIALS ARE INCLUDED

Drawing boards, paper, pencils, wire, and pliers will all be provided, but feel free to bring your own materials.”

New year, new work. After spending 2024+2025 delving into ultra simplified figures, I’m expanding both in size and compl...
01/14/2026

New year, new work. After spending 2024+2025 delving into ultra simplified figures, I’m expanding both in size and complexity with new wall work. Adding layers of detail and pattern while trying to keep the simplicity that I found in work from the last couple years, just with the next level of detail.

This is just a preview, and the work is still developing, but I think these will make the cut for my various shows and fairs this winter and spring.

What’s to come: more gender neutral figures in loose comfy clothing, play with pattern and composition, play with rendering vs abstracting, play with level of detail.

01/05/2026

I like to check my work against the sky as I’m building it, not because of the lack of white walls in my studio, but because I think it looks rad. Takes me back to my younger days when I would attach pieces to sign posts and hang them from telephone wires.

I’ve really been loving this series of my take on Grecian urns. It’s a continuation of the figures I’ve been building, w...
12/04/2025

I’ve really been loving this series of my take on Grecian urns. It’s a continuation of the figures I’ve been building, while pursuing another angle on drawing vs sculpture (fun fact - traditional vessels were a collaboration between potter and painter, with each artisan and artist fulfilling their role, so while sculptural the “art” was seen as distinct from the three dimensional form of the vessel). While Grecian urns traditionally depicted myths, I’m choosing to show scenes of daily life, allowing the viewer to create narrative instead of using a familiar story.

Of the first seven I built, three were sold in Chicago, and the other four are currently in Amsterdam with . Of these eight new works, three will be on view at for their Vessel Show opening December 13th, and the other five will be with me at for opening December 6th.

I had planned to move toward portraiture again this winter, but this series has really taken hold of me.

These couches with frames have been an excellent way to play with the relationship between drawn line and sculpture. The...
10/28/2025

These couches with frames have been an excellent way to play with the relationship between drawn line and sculpture. The couches are almost wire frames, in full three dimensions, whereas the figures operate on multiple planes, stretched across the couch. Finally the frames exist on a single plane, implying a wall behind the couch onto which they would be hung.

These works have been a major challenge - each couch is sculpted in full, and then overlap is removed after welding on the figure. Remove too much and it will collapse, remove to little and extraneous line muddies the image and breaks the illusion that the air defined by the wire has mass. Because these are sculptures and not drawings, I do not have the luxury of letting my lines float - everything needs to be connected and self supporting.

These works are significantly more time consuming than my other figures, but the challenge of designing and fabricating them makes them captivating to create.

The first two works are sold - “One Too Many” via , “Long Day” via in Los Angeles.

“After Dinner Party 1” and “After Dinner Party 2” will be coming with me to Chicago, opening Thursday.

During the process of drawing over 100 still lives of flowers in vases, I found myself compelled to expand the process t...
10/22/2025

During the process of drawing over 100 still lives of flowers in vases, I found myself compelled to expand the process to include illustrated vessels inspired by Grecian urns.

This year has found me thinking more about drawing versus sculpture, form vs plane. Grecian urns, and illustrated vessels as a whole, also deal with this tension - where does the art lie, in the surface decoration or in the physical form? How does the relationship between form and illustration affect the impact of the work?

Unlike Grecian urns, and going contrary to basic sculptural theory, my work has a hierarchy of viewpoint - a preferential view, whereas when I was a sculpture major in college I was taught to create work which has no “front” or “back.”

These wire vessels are meant to be mounted on the wall and viewed like a drawing, however unlike drawing the work exists in three dimensions, and the works’ sculptural elements are highlighted when the piece is viewed from an angle.

The illustrations pull from my work earlier this year, composed of traditional figure drawing poses recontextualized into subtly narrative scenes via the inclusion of everyday objects. Sometimes I break from the form, letting the illustrations extend beyond the boundary of the vessel and breaking the illusion of a contour drawing of an object, making the work be simultaneously more of a drawing despite being sculpture.

These works will be coming with me to in Chicago, opening next Thursday.

Address

Oakland, CA
94601–94615, 94617–94624, 94649, 94659–94662, 94666

Opening Hours

Monday 9am - 6pm
Tuesday 9am - 6pm
Wednesday 9am - 6pm
Thursday 9am - 6pm
Friday 9am - 6pm

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