For the untrained eye in the ways of sculpture, no put-down intended, the most appropriate approach to guide one through DeWitt´s work can be found in an ancient Greek sentence: “To learn to look is to learn to see; to learn to see is to learn to understand; and to learn to understand is to learn to love.” For the artist, this is an extraordinary process. In addition to strong form, Mr. DeWitt works with the way light envelopes  the piece and creates a synthesis of sense experiences that can only be termed an epiphany. Through his sculptures, one can view the world, as Duncan Phillips asserts, with rapture and wonder as an “introspective voyager.”

Take the figure of a horse.  At first glance it may seem to be a static representation; however, upon further exploration one discovers how the light that envelopes it creates something new and fluid, the way notes on a page in a symphony flow together once the orchestra turns the abstraction into sound. DeWitt´s sculptures take on a unique form when he works towards making monuments. This uniqueness holds whether the monument is as small as an Egyptian scarab or as large as the pyramid itself. Here mind fuses with the natural world. Something new and magical emerges out of clouds in the sky, foam along the seashore, multitudes of animals, and “ordinary” human beings.

To inspire the viewer is the primary goal of his work. This may sound very “serious,” but his work is especially joyful and rich with humor. In the most inclusive sense of the word, he celebrates life; not simply the creative process alone, “… for one who is merely creative is merely a creative fool”, attributed to none other than Pablo Picasso. Though the above may suggest that all of his work is sunny in tone, he looks at the world and also embraces the darker more macabre shades of life. Examples of these  can be found in his sculptures of The Four Horsemen of the Apocalypse, the Mustang, the Flight of Fantasy, the Agony, and the Crucifixion. His imagination extends into painting, where he creates something like a Book of Nightmares. Taken all together, his art constitutes a metaphor of life.

So the untrained eye can learn to see the world through DeWitt´s  eyes. He synthesizes sculptural, geometric form, visual engineering, light, shadow, motion and tension, rhythm, and lyricism. The result is something powerful, energetic, awe-inspiring. DeWitt always attempts to compete with himself in a constant quest for excellence. Professor V.P.S. Esser at the Royal Academy of Fine Art in Amsterdam, the Netherlands, called his work examples of “strong, refined form”.

— edited by professor Jack Kligerman