The natural world serves as the star in the Williamsburg Art Gallery’s upcoming exhibit, showcasing the wildlife sculptures of a father and son team. The exhibit debuts with a public reception at the gallery Tuesday.
Gallery co-owner Clyde Berryman praised William and David Turner’s quality craftsmanship and the origin behind it.
“I think it’s a really storybook father-son collaboration,” he said. “There’s a huge range also.”
The Turners’ work celebrates the creatures with which they’ve coexisted as Eastern Shore natives.
“The inspiration has just been love and passion for nature and wildlife,” son David Turner said.
David Turner said his family traces their roots in the region back to the 1600s. He recalled being 6 years old when his father took up creating ceramic wildlife figures as a means of helping pay for dental school while living in Richmond. His father encouraged him to experiment with stonework clay, and he began crafting animals like the ducks and geese, which he also helped raise.
David Turner went on to major in biology at William and Mary while minoring in studio art, something he thought would be more of a hobby as planned to pursue a career in wildlife management and environmental science. But in 1983, he and his father founded Turner Sculpture in Onley, a town in Accomack County on the Eastern Shore.
Using primarily bronze and silver as their media, the two have since crafted hundreds of works across various sizes, including more than 100 large, publicly commissioned pieces. In 1992, they presented a sculpture titled “Bonefish” to President George H.W. Bush inside the Oval Office. In 2016, Yorktown’s American Revolution Museum commissioned “Freedom’s Sentinel,” a 500-pound eagle with an 18-foot wingspan alongside two eaglets, which now sits out front.
“My goal is to capture the essence of the animal I’m portraying,” David Turner said, adding that such an essence is more important than recreating every individual hair or feather.
Berryman praised their attention to detail and ability to bring to life unique behaviors that define the animals. The Williamsburg Art Gallery already showcases two Turner sculptures: an elk bust and a fox in the midst of stalking prey.
At their gallery exhibit, David Turner said they plan to showcase a wider variety of their pieces, including some newer ones. David Turner’s showcase will include a cedar waxwing sculpture with a unique tripod based form by three branches and a playful river otter he recently completed. William Turner will feature his own works, such as “Mother’s Pride,” which depicts a Canada goose with ducklings tucked beneath her feathers.
“I hope they like our interpretations of the creatures and hopefully they feel like the creatures show some essence, and also some expression, and evoke a feeling of what’s true to that feeling of the particular creature,” David Turner said.
Want to go?
The Turner exhibit opens with a reception 5:30-8 p.m. Tuesday at the Williamsburg Art Gallery, 440A W. Duke of Gloucester St. David Turner will be present at the event. Free and open to the public. The exhibit will remain through at least Thursday.
