Knap Series: Orb Wrap

Franz Johansen
American, b. 1928

Nathan Johansen
American, b. 1958

​Knap Series: Orb Wrap, 2000

Bronze, 5.25' 6' 4.625'

Museum Purchase with the President’s Fund for Sculpture, NEHMA

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A father and son team of artists, Franz and Nathan Johansen, created Knap Series: Orb Wrap, which is located south of the University Inn. Franz is best known as the founder of the LDS contemporary art movement and makes sculptures and paintings to illustrate concepts of Mormon theology. His son Nathan finds inspiration in the natural world, depicting the life cycles of seeds and plants and their relationships to mankind. Knap Series: Orb Wrap is from Nathan’s ongoing Knap Series in which he explores the unexpected shapes, angles, and lines produced by the process of knapping, an ancient way to make tools by striking one stone with another to remove flakes and shape the tool. Here, the father and son team depict knapping as a metaphor for rebirth and resurrection.