Zweygardt ’67 is interviewed for a KPTS
Channel 8 public television program.
A whirlwind of activities greeted Glenn Zweygardt ’67 on his return to campus the week of Feb. 23.
In addition to his WSU Distinguished Alumni Speaker Series lecture, he enjoyed a personal tour of the Ulrich Museum, lunch with School of Art, Design and Creative Industries faculty, afternoon visits with grad students at their campus studios, and a reception in his honor hosted by members of the First Unitarian Universalist Church, which holds one of his sculptures, shown in the photo at left.
Zweygardt, who hadn’t been back to Wichita in many years, says getting reacquainted with his alma mater and the wider community was a fulfilling experience, and a nostalgic one.
He says the late Mira Merriman, a noted art historian, was the WSU professor who influenced him the most deeply as a student.
After his studies at WSU, he earned an MFA from the Rinehart School of Sculpture at Maryland Institute College of Art in Baltimore.
He took to the East, staying to teach sculpture at the New York College of Ceramics at Alfred University for nearly 40 years.
Zweygardt, an award-winning educator for creative teaching and for the development of glass casting into metal forms, became an emeritus professor of sculpture in 2007.
He continues to create signature works in his studio, where he and his partner operate their own bronze foundry. His sculptures of steel, ductile iron, stainless steel, cast glass, cast bronze and aluminum range from monumental outdoor works to small, intimate pieces.
Held in numerous private, public, university and museum collections worldwide, his sculptures, the artist notes, are forged and fabricated on the foundation of a skill he learned growing up on his parent’s high plains farm near St. Francis, Kan. – welding.
