Oscar Sandri
THE BEGINNINGS
It all began in the early 1900s, when my great-great-grandfather Gaetano, owner of marble quarries at Caprino Veronese, traded marble blocks. My great-grandfather Leonello and my grandfather Arturo carried on with the company, where my father Leonello Sandri, a young boy then, started to work, too.
After the World War II my father first moved to Germany and then to Switzerland to refine his stone cutting skills among numerous local sculptors.
FROM MY FATHER’S HANDS
In the 1970s he returned to Italy and opened his own workshop. There was a flourishing marble industry and numerous satellite and spin-off activities in Verona’s thereabouts, and my father gained recognition for his attention to details and marked artistic streak.
I was born in 1966. When I turned 14 I started working at my father’s workshop. It’s actually from him, my father Leonello Sandri, that I learned the principles of the art that has been passed on from generation to generation in our family. I have never met my great-grandparents and knew but a little my grandparents, but despite this I heartily thank my father for having opened their world to me and for raising in me a great passion for sculpture.
My further studies gave me a good artistic education, allowed me to get to know various conceptions and movements in plastic art and broadened my horizons of creativity.
THE 2000’S
At the beginning of 2000 my father passed the company reins into my hands, and I’m trying to update the sculpting concept to a more contemporary style.
Sometimes when I watch my hands move I recognize in them those of my father’s, and realize that those time-honored, ripetitive, almost instinctive, carving gestures convey to the observer a unique emotion of profound envolvement.
TODAY
Working and interacting with other architects and sculptors and participating in exhibitions and various international events made me known overseas. My works have found their home throughout the world: in Europe, Japan, Arab countries, Russia, in American continent – anywhere there are people ready to dream together with me.