Sculptor Burton Blistein sculpts in bronze, clay, plaster, wax, cement, polyester and epoxy resins. He casts his bronzes in his own foundry from one-of-a-kind wax originals. This gives him greater control of the finished sculpture, and permits development of forms too intricate and fragile to survive transport to a commercial foundry.

In his sculptures Blistein strives to fuse feeling and thought. Words cannot adequately describe this unique composite of antitheses. Expression remains inexpressible in any terms other than those integral to the artwork.

Like all authentic works of art, Blistein’s sculptures are complete in themselves. They differ from the works of many sculptors in also forming a continuous, interrelated series.  Later works develop and amplify the expressive content of earlier, and earlier illuminate later.

The spectator contributes to and complicates this relation.  The work of art is the end of a quest for the artist.  It is the beginning of one for the perceptive viewer, serving as the point of the departure for a complex train of associations. For that reason, because a successful work always expresses more than its maker intends, and because the “meaning” of the sculpted image cannot be adequately conveyed in words, Blistein is reluctant to offer explanations or interpretations of his imagery. Anything he might say would only limit the spectator’s responses.