Wendell Castle

Considered the father of the American art furniture movement, Wendell Castle’s work is found in more than 40 museums and cultural institutions worldwide, including The Arts Aventura Mall Collection. Born in Kansas in 1932, Wendell studied industrial design and sculpture at the University of Kansas. His pristine craftsmanship and creativity later took him to Rochester, New York, where he taught at the School of American Craftsmen and served as head of the woodworking department at the Rochester Institute of Technology.

Blurring the lines between form and function, the late artist challenged the role of traditional furniture with an illustrious career that spanned four decades. The artistic pioneer sought to challenge norms with imaginative forms that carry his own sense of humor and creativity. “I want to be inventive and playful, to produce furniture that makes life an adventure,” Castle once said.

Castle gained global acclaim and received numerous awards in his lifetime, including the Modernism Lifetime Achievement Award from the Brooklyn Museum (2007) and a gold medal from the American Craft Council (1997). Castle passed away in 2018 but his work lives on in museums, such as The Museum of Modern Art, the Metropolitan Museum of Art, the Smithsonian’s American Art Museum, The Art Institute of Chicago, and other American galleries.