John T. Sharp (b. 1943, Ohio) is one of America’s leading wildlife wood sculptors. He studied architecture and industrial design at Kent State University and worked in the commercial design industry for 18 years before becoming a full-time sculptor in the eighties. Inspired by his love for wildlife and the medium of wood, Sharp creates stunning life-size sculptures hewn from a single log, channeling both the American folk art tradition of wildfowl decoys and the dynamism of early modern European still life painting.
His career in fine art wood carving has earned him major recognition for his awe-inspiring, integral pieces, leading the field with three decades of awards at the Ward World Championship Wildfowl Carving Competition in Ocean City, Maryland, and the Master Wildlife Artist Award from the Leigh Yawkey Woodson Art Museum in Wausau, Wisconsin, in 1996.
His work is held in private, corporate, and public collections, including the Cleveland Museum of Natural History (Cleveland, Ohio), the MBNA Bank, the Leigh Yawkey Woodson Art Museum (Wausau, Wisconsin), the Genesee Country Museum (Mumford, New York), the Ward Museum of Wildfowl Art (Salisbury, Maryland), the Algonquin Gallery and Museum (Ontario, Canada), and the Nature in Art Museum and Gallery (Gloucester, England).
