I had the good fortune to spend some time in Thailand and Vietnam this past month. Asian sculptural artworks appeared everywhere, from golden metal sculptures, to sculpture studios offering monumental size marble sculptures, in hotels, and especially Buddhist temples. I was blown away by a museum in Da Nang, Vietnam that exhibited monumental stone sculptures carved during the 5th-9th century, and expressing Hindu and Buddhist carvings. What a discovery.

The Da Nang Museum of Cham Sculpture is one of the first museums built in Vietnam by the French. The main building was constructed in 1915. It evokes some motifs of French colonial architecture in the early twentieth century and resembles the image of the Champa temples - towers in Central Viet Nam.

I had the opportunity to contemplate more than 400 sculptures on display, including National Treasures and others representing the masterpieces of Champa sculpture in ten centuries (from 5th to 15th). The sculptures were made in a variety of materials, such as sandstone, terracotta, and metal. Grounded in various themes from fertility symbols, deities, mythical animals and architectural decoration from the Hindu and Buddhist, they express the features of cultural and religious values of the Champa people over many generations. The Da Nang Museum of Cham Sculpture was a must-see destination for me having half of my life creating sculptures.

Though I took hundreds of photos, my creative time was designing two engraved copper portals. It was time to bring these two copper discs into a sculptural form. I had purchased the two discs from Alaska Copper and Brass in Seattle in the late 90s. They have traveled from my home studio on Bainbridge Island, to Ojai when Lisa and I moved here in 2011. Eleven years later, we were volunteering in Poland do to the war in Ukraine, they traveled with my tools with hopes that I would have the creative inspiration to design these copper discs into sculptures.

Well the inspiration came while in Vietnam, using graphic images I've collected and loving the toroidal geometric designs that are inspired by my Holos design and embossed paper wall artworks. I thought the best way to display these sculptures would be to hang the discs within a circular stand. Though they are not yet ready to be seen, I plan to exhibit one of them in the OSA exhibition in the Ojai Valley Museum, and have the second one for the October OSA Studio Tour.

My home studio is open by appointment. You are welcome to view my artworks, or purchase what connects with you. I have finally combined my artworks under the domain BrianBerman.art This website brings my former websites BermanSculpture.com and Holosamulets.com under one website BrianBerman.art I look forward to sharing my art with you.