Brentwood sculptor finishes piece, prepares for show

Quoting the verses of Roman myth, Brentwood artist Miguel Flores explained where he came up with the idea of his latest completed sculpture, "Venus and Adonis." The sculpture was unveiled at the artist's home on Valentine's Day at a private party for relatives and friends. Creating the bronze art took 19 months of hard work and dedication to get it to come out just the way Flores wanted it.

The story behind the sculpture is a familiar tale to mythology and Shakespeare fans. Venus, the goddess of love and keeper of cupid, is hit by one of cupid's arrows right before she lays eyes on Adonis, a young mortal.

"The goddess Venus tries to restrain her lover Adonis from going off to the hunt. She clings to him, imploring him not to go, but Adonis looks down at her impassively," Flores said, explaining the tragic love story found in Ovid's "Metamorphoses." "The story ends tragically. During the hunt the mortal Adonis is fatally gored by a wild boar."

For Flores creating the bronze took a great deal of concentration and trial and error. Over a nearly two- year period, he cast a clay mold and then had a special bronze mold made to set the final bronze sculpture. While working on the sculpture, the clay mold kept breaking, he said. Each time, Flores repeated the work of putting the clay pack together or restarting from scratch. Each time he would add more detail to the original piece.

"You can see the added detail in the Adonis' shoelaces here," he said pointing to the feet of the sculpture. All together, Flores says there are seven replicas of the mold.

"I was really very impressed with Miguel's 'Venus and Adonis,' " said local artist and gallery owner Bill Weber. "It turned out really great. I'm hoping Miguel will be one of the artists we feature in the new gallery. I really like all of his work."

Flores began his artist career when he was in second grade and continued to work on his art over the many years since. At 74 he has completed many different forms of art in his lifetime, including sculptures and paintings. He also worked as an actor in off Broadway plays in New York, did modeling and spent a great deal of time taking singing lessons to become a better singer. He grew up playing the violin.

Over his lifetime Flores produced art of many different medias. In the 1960s he worked with the very popular erotic or pop art. While touring Paris he visited Monet's home and became interested in the artist's style of art and did many impressionist paintings. He has worked on many different commissioned pieces of art and even spent some time working as a commercial artist.

The city of Brentwood and the Brentwood Chamber of Commerce use one of Flores' paintings as part of their logos. The painting of downtown Brentwood can be seen on both the city and the chamber's Web sites.

More of Flores' art can be seen on the Artists Open Studio Tour on May 16 and 17. Artists throughout Brentwood, Oakley and Discovery Bay open their homes and studios for visitors to come and take a look at their art.

Flores doesn't yet have a buyer for the "Venus and Adonis" work and hopes it will still be on display during the Artist Open Studio Tour.