Artist Birthday: Scott Burton (1939-1989 US)

Scott Burton was an ingenious sculptor/furniture maker who established a unique body of work that functioned as both sculpture and furniture. Burton’s sculpture-installations often functioned as public art.

Artist Birthday for 23 June: Scott Burton (1939-1989 US)

Scott Burton, Stone Chair, Georgia marble, 97.3 x 109.3 x 86.4 cm  Philadelphia Museum of Art, © 2026 Scott Burton / Artists Rights Society (ARS), New York, (PMA-9512bmars)

One of Burton’s keen interest in his creation of his furniture-like sculptures is breaking down the boundaries between the traditional concepts of “fine” and “decorative” art forms. In this respect he carried on an idea that had begun with the Russian Constructivists and was then continued by the Bauhaus artists in Germany. Both of these early 1900s movements emphasized applying the aesthetic of fine art to everyday life in objects. Burton believed that his sculptures should exist in, around, under, and over the people viewing them.

From behind, Burton’s Rock Chair resembles nothing more than an outcropping of granite. The rough veining of the stone is in stark contrast to the polished right angle cut into the front as the “seat.” His sculptures, mostly of stone, always remain part furniture, thus undermining the common idea that art is separate from life.

Background 

The history of furniture is defined by forms that have accommodated the human body through the many vicissitudes of fashion and what is fashionable, impacted also by concurrent trends in painting, sculpture and architecture. In essence, furniture is an excellent gauge of what has happened in history, socially, and artistically. The rapid industrialization of Western Europe and the United States during the late 1800s and early  1900s had a major impact on, at first, the mass production of furniture, and later on the style of furniture.

As the 1900s progressed, furniture was less about the conformity, and more about being a reflection of a modern, industrial, progressive society. With that in mind, many furniture artists use their furniture designs in much the same ways as many contemporary painters or sculptors, as avenues of personal expression, regardless of what is the current trend.

In the 2000s, furniture has truly evolved to the point where it is often indistinguishable from sculpture or installation. The quest for self-expression by designers has unfortunately become part of  the "celebrity" mentality of the commercial world, where artists' furniture designs are often priced for only the wealthy.

Scott Burton was born in Alabama but was raised by his mother in Washington. There he developed an interest in art and furniture design, studying painting in high school. After graduation he studied with painter Hans Hofmann (1880-1966) in the Provincetown art colony. Uncertain his passion for furniture and design would lead to a career in art, he obtained a BA and MA in literature from Columbia and New York University. He then became a regular free-lance critic for Art News and Art in America in the 1960s.

In the early 1970s, Burton began working earnestly to become a full time artist. His first works were part of the performance art genre that was so important in the late 1960s and early 1970s. His first exhibitions at Artists Space in New York were in 1975. He exhibited a tableau of furniture found on the street, inhabited by silent, slow-moving actors. Eventually these tableaux evolved into mere groupings of furniture with no actors. From there he moved on to fabricating his own designs for furniture.