Resides: Milwaukee, Wis.
On his preferred style: I prefer realism. I think mankind has interpreted the human form since the beginning of time. Human anatomy is the most often-used subject matter. My thing was to develop realism on a three-dimensional scale.
On using his father as a model: The most popular piece I’ve ever done is my father. It’s a psychologically interesting probe: of all the sculptures, your father became the most important one.
On creating a Jesus sculpture: I did casting from sections of anatomy and I assembled it all like parts of a puzzle. Then I became a painter. I picked up my paints and magnifying glass and painted freckles, moles and age spots.
On inspiring a gastric bypass: This heavy-set guy came around to the studio all the time—he was turning into a groupie. He said, “If you ever need a real big guy [as a model], let me know.” One day I just said, “Let me do it.” Later, he walked in and stood in front of the sculpture (pictured at right) and he stared and stared and said, “Marc, I never realized I was that big.” He left in shock, called the doctor and scheduled a gastric bypass. He came back to the exhibit six months later. He was like a before-and-after shot.
On breathing into his sculptures: I was all by myself in the studio on a Friday night. My friends were out playing and I was working. I thought, “I want this to come to life, to flourish.” I don’t talk about this very often, but I put my mouth over the mouth of the sculpture to breathe life into it. It was corny. I felt uncomfortable with myself.
On his self-portrait in sculpture form: I rediscovered it in storage last year after 20 years. I realized in a heartbeat how fast 20 years went by.
Notes on this article:I first saw Marc Sijan's at The Uptown Art Fair and I was blown away. As a wanna-be artist myself, hyper-realistic art is one of my favorite genres, and his pieces all had a forlornness about them that seemed to reflect Sijan's personal universe. I talked to him twice for the interview while he was driving into Minneapolis for another Uptown Art Fair. When he came to the office for his photo shoot, he rolled in driving a big white van full of disembodied head sculptures and limbs in progress. He carried his sculpture in with the help of the art director, Bryan, and everyone in the office stopped and stared in horror at the stiff body we were shoving into the elevator. It was pretty funny.
