Over the past 35 years Craig Kraft has gained national recognition in creating original works of art that advance the techniques he has developed while working with drawn neon lines and sculptural light volumes surrounding the figure, holographic style lit negative body casts sited on buildings around the world, to monumental outdoor rolled aluminum and neon sculptures. Kraft achieved his Bachelor’s and Master’s degrees from the University of Wisconsin, Madison. For the past 25 years he has been a faculty member of the Smithsonian Institution Studio Arts Program. His sculptures have been featured in over 120 exhibits throughout the U.S.A. (17+ solo) and he has been a leader of the International Sculpture Conference twice. Recently, Kraft has been commissioned to create monumental rolled aluminum light sculptures for both Montgomery County Maryland and P.F.A. for the Downtown Silver Spring Development as well as for Anacostia Arts Center and The Arlington Arts Center in Arlington, Virginia. He was invited to exhibit at both The Busan Biennale Art Festival 2004 and Hermandades Escultoricas 2005 in Merida Yucatan Mexico. Kraft Resides at 1239 Good Hope Rd SE, Washington, D.C. U.S.A. His work can be seen at his home gallery and studio, a historic building in Anacostia. His pieces are for sale and he is available for commissioned artwork.

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Since 1983, the common thread in my work has been neon light. I have used neon for its versatility: long-lasting industrial strength, vast possibilities of color, and its willingness to be bent into almost any shape or form. It is the contradictory nature of light: tangible but intangible, substantial but insubstantial that draws the viewer into the artwork. It is, after all, how we see things. Light is in constant flux; it begs questions about perception and importance.

My artworks are generated from rolled and painted aluminum tubing and neon. The dimensions of the tubing vary from 1 ¾ “ x 3 “ up to 6 “ x 3 “ for monumental scale sculpture. The neon tubing is shaped three dimensionally, highlighting the aluminum structure from all sides. These techniques have allowed me to bring the colored lines and reflected volumes of light into wide-open spaces. When the clean lines of neon interact with a new or existing architectural structure, volumes of light are created three dimensionally, resulting in a site inspired, integrated light sculpture

Light sculptures have both a sense of newness and energy and they are about the future as much as the present. There is also an element of marking, which the crossing of colored lines against one another generates. The effect of the sculpture is to mark importance, not just of location but also significance. The sculptural mark of light resonates in the collective memory