Home Public Works Gallery Installations Complete List of All Works Exhibitions Awards
James Sanborn has had work exhibited at the High Museum of Art, the Los Angeles County Museum of Art, the Phillips Collection and the Hirshhorn Museum. He has been commissioned to create artwork for such sites as the Massachusetts Institute of Technology, the Central Intelligence Agency and the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration.
Sanborn was born in 1945 in Washington, D.C. His father, a print maker, was the Director of Exhibitions at the Library of Congress for 30 years. His mother was a pianist and photo researcher. Sanborn grew up in Alexandria, Virginia, attended JEB Stuart High School in Fairfax, and went on to study archaeology and Romanesque cathedrals. He studied archaeology at Oxford University, and received a Bachelor of Arts degree in paleontology, fine arts, and social anthropology in 1968 from Randolph-Macon College in Ashland Virginia, and a Master of Fine Arts degree in sculpture from Pratt Institute in Brooklyn in 1971. He taught at Montgomery College in Rockville, and for nine years was the artist-in-residence and taught classes at Glen Echo Park. He has also traveled extensively in Asia, and in 1983 was commissioned to install a piece outside of Tokyo.
Mr. Sanborn is noted for his work with American stone and related materials that evoke a sense of mystery and the forces of nature. He is probably best known for the "Kryptos" sculpture installed at CIA Headquarters in 1990, which displays encrypted messages which continue to stump code-breakers to this day.
Sanborn contact info: This website is not directly associated with Mr. Sanborn. If you have a question about any of the information on this website, please contact the webmistress at elonka@aol.com. If you are interested in purchasing or displaying Sanborn's work, please contact kryptos@earthlink.net
The following is a small sample of Sanborn's works. Please click here if you are instead interested in a complete list. The items below were chosen by the webmistress because they are either major pieces, well-known works, or for no other reason than that she really likes them. :)
| Title | Location | Medium | Date | |
 |
Cold
Spring Outcrop (may also be known as "Wabash Outcrop") |
West Cold Spring Metro Stop Baltimore, MD |
Sandstone sculpture | 1981-1983 |
 |
All the Ships Sailed in Circles (additional image here) |
Kaohsiung Museum of Fine Arts Kaohsiung, Taiwan R.O.C. |
granite, quartz, lodestone, copper, chinese text, water channel - 30'd x 14'h | ?? |
 |
Striking Stones Under the Thunder | Exhibition: Natural
Settings |
Sandstone, lodestone, shadow, and slate. 20' x 11' x 3' (also listed as 25' x 12' x 4') | 1985 |
 |
Find the Lodestone | Artery Plaza Building Bethesda, MD |
Quartz, sandstone, granite, 13x5x5' | 1985 |
 |
Invisible Forces | Electronic Industries
Alliance building, Arlington, VA |
18' high granite, ice-blue quartz, magnetized lodestone | 1987 |
 |
Kryptos | CIA Headquarters, Langley, Virginia |
Entrance: 150'L x 12' w x 3'h Courtyard Plaza: 20'L x 10'w x12'h Courtyard lawn: 60'L x 12'w x 3'h Polished red granite, quartz,. copperplate, lodestone, encoded text, myscanthus grasses, water, and petrified wood |
Commissioned in 1988, dedicated 1990 |
 |
The Cyrillic Projector
(aka "Encoded Cylinder") additional image here |
University of North Carolina, Charlotte | Bronze, light, 5' diam | Created in early 90s, installed in 1997 |
 | Coastline (more images & info here) | National Oceanic & Atmospheric Administration Silver Spring, MD | Granite, water, wave generator (Variwave multisequential, computer controlled pneumatically operated system) | 1993 |
 |
Indian Run Park |
U.S. Federal Courthouse Beltsville, MD |
granite, copper, water, Iroquois text, bronze cylinder with Onondaga text, myscanthus grasses, "Seneca Red" gravel, 5,000 - 10,000 arrowheads | 1994 |
 |
Implied Geometries: Notom, Utah | Numark Gallery | Photography of projected light 120' square | 1995 |
 |
Covert Balance (aka Antipodes?) | Hirshhorn Museum and Sculpture Garden; Washington, DC | copper, waterjet cut text, petrified tree - 6'L x 2'w x 9'h | ?? |
|
Adam Smith's Spinning Top (more info here and here, and additional image here) |
University of North Carolina, Charlotte | Bronze, 9' x 12' | 1996-1997 |
 |
Antipodes | Hirshhorn Museum, D.C. | Copper and petrified wood | 1997 |
 |
Wealth
of Nations (aka "Adam Smith's Spinning Top #2") (more info here and pictures here and here) |
Cleveland State University | Bronze and waterjet cut text - 20'd x 9' h | 1998 |
 |
Light Volume Study 1: Bandon, Oregon | Numark Gallery | Photograph of projected light on fog, diameter 2 miles | 1998 |
 |
Binary Systems other images here and here |
Central Computing Facility Internal Revenue Service, Martinsburg, WV |
Copper, granite, lodestone | 1999 |
 |
Caloosahatchee Manuscripts
(also known as "Lux") (text in English and Creek Indian language -- more info here and additional images here and here) |
Old Post Office Building Fort Myers, Florida |
bronze, waterjet cut text, pin point light source | 2001 |
 |
Circulating Capital (more info here) |
Central Connecticut State University New Britain, CT |
Bronze | 2001 |
 |
?? | Zola
Spy Restaurant, Washington, D.C. (other info here) |
?? | ?? |
Page created: June 20, 2003. Please send additions, corrections, or other comments to elonka@aol.com
A special thank you to people who helped compile some of this initial information: Bill Houck, Gary Warzin, David Wilson, and the folks at the Kryptos discussion group. Thanks! :)
Updates:
(9/17/2003) - Substantially reorganized site and menu structure. Added information received from the extremely helpful Caroline Danforth of the Virginia Cultural Affairs Division in Arlington County, Nicole Semenchuk from the Smithsonian American Art museum, and dozens of images and other information from the gracious, wonderful and dazzlingly well-informed Public Art Consultant Francoise Yohalem. Thank you so much! :)
(8/11/2003) - Added picture of James Sanborn, and more information about the "Filter Media" exhibition obtained by researcher Nadine Granoff from the Nancy Drysdale files.
(7/21/2003) - Adding information from articles obtained by researcher Nadine Granoff, thank you!
(7/18/2003) - Adding listing for "Kayenta Arizona 2"
(7/7/2003) - Reorganized page, and added information received courtesy of Mimi Games from the Virginia Museum of Fine Arts, and Jennifer Maxwell from the Southeast Museum of Photography
(7/3/2003) - Added information obtained from the Federal Reserve Board Art Gallery, and the High Museum of Art.
(7/1/2003) Added information about "Animisme" piece, courtesy of the High Museum. Added pictures of Cleveland "Manuscript Pages" sculpture, courtesy of Dr. Richard Nelson for the pics, and David Wilson for the webpage!
(6/30/2003) Added listings of pieces from the "Covert Obsolescence" exhibition, courtesy of Marisa Bourgoin at the Corcoran Gallery.
(6/25/2003) Added mention of some exhibitions from info sent to me by Clare Vasquez of the St. Louis Art Museum. Thanks!
(6/24/2003) Added a few pieces that I found mentioned in the Smithsonian Art Museum Catalog
Return to Elonka's Kryptos Page
|
|
