Arizona Bronze Fine Art Foundry was established in 1977 by sculptor Jasper D’Ambrosi in Tempe, Arizona. The foundry employed Jasper’s two sons Mike and Marc D’Ambrosi and was by definition a "family business" in the best sense of a large Italian family. Uncles, aunts, cousins, sisters and Ruth, Jasper’s wife, all contributed to and worked in the business. Tom Bollinger, the present day owner, was the foundry’s first 'outside the family' employee (think the Irish character played by Robert Duvall in the first Godfather movie).

Over the last 22 years Arizona Bronze has earned a reputation as a full service art foundry which produces sculpture of the highest quality, at reasonable and fair prices and with a unique "artist oriented" environment.

Arizona Bronze has produced sculpture for many of the country’s most recognized sculptors; including Jasper D’Ambrosi, John Battenberg, Fritz Scholder, Ed Mell, Robert Wick, Ben Goo among others. The foundry produces sculptures in any scale, from table top to monumental.

After leaving Arizona Bronze, Tom Bollinger, also a sculptor, went on to become Foundry Director for Shidoni Foundry in Santa Fe, NM and later Foundry Manager and consultant for Tallix in Beacon, New York. Bollinger was responsible for the doubling of the production capacity of Shidoni in the mid-1980’s and oversaw that facilities phenomenal growth. After 10 years as a studio artist in Sedona, Arizona, Bollinger was asked to return to Shidoni to manage the Foundry a second time. Following the second tenure at Shidoni, Bollinger accepted the position of Manager at Tallix, the largest art foundry in the world. In these positions Bollinger was instrumental in the production of numerous large scale projects for many of the world’s most notable sculptors. These include Alan Houser, Dewaine Valentine, Korczak Ziolkowski, Claus Oldenberg, Tom Otterness, the Frank Lloyd Wright Foundation, Gutzon and Lincoln Borglum, and Glenna Goodacre among many others.

Tom Bollinger purchased Arizona Bronze from Mike and Marc D’Ambrosi in November of 1997. Since the transition, Arizona Bronze has undergone a ground up revitalization of equipment, process and production techniques. Bollinger has also gathered a group of highly experienced and expertly trained artisans.

Arizona Bronze, based in Tempe, Arizona, part of the rapidly growing Greater Phoenix Metropolitan area, is poised at the start of the new millennium to respond to the cultural growth of this dynamic community.

 

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