April 18, 2021

Jeff Rosenfeld

Jeff Rosenfeld grew up in Denver, Colorado, where his parents still live. His artistic beginnings trace to his father's basement wood shop, where he learned to make things out of wood and worked on a lathe. His first sale was a wooden bowl he made on the lathe, purchased by his aunt for fifty dollars with the prediction it would be worth something someday. He used that same lathe to create mezuzot that he sold while attending Brandeis University in Massachusetts, and he sold a couple more while studying abroad in Israel.

After college and time spent living elsewhere, Rosenfeld moved to Irving and then to Dallas, where he has lived for about 19 years. In 2009 his father invited him to a marble carving course in Marble, Colorado, home of the quarry associated with the Lincoln and Washington monuments, as a father-son activity. There he learned to carve marble over the course of a week amid beautiful scenery. He returned home, gathered some stone, and began working in his backyard, a practice he continues to this day as a way to take his mind off daily concerns.

Rosenfeld works primarily in stone, including marble, alabaster, and onyx, and has also worked in metal and, occasionally, painting. His style is contemporary and abstract, favoring simpler shapes, curves, and ribbon forms while pushing toward more complex designs that reflect an architectural or mathematical sensibility. He embraces the natural color of stone, seeking out varieties in a wide range of hues, such as Brazilian sodalite and Turkish lilac marble. Judaism is an important part of his life and appears in works like a stone menorah and an abstract Star of David, though it is not the primary focus of his art. He hopes viewers will experience his sculptures from multiple angles as three-dimensional works.

Read Full Transcript