Stephanie Hess
Stephanie is an award-winning sculptor based in Dublin.
Born in Singapore to Irish parents with a taste for adventure, Stephanie lived widely throughout Europe, Canada and the States before settling in South Africa from 2000-2014. This period saw her explore ceramics and sculpture under the tutelage of local and international artists. She found a bronze casting course in 2003 to be an exhilarating introduction to the medium, sparking a love for the material and the process. Stephanie and her family came to live in Ireland in 2014 and she began casting her work with CAST foundry in Dublin. Within a few months she submitted her work to the prestigious Royal Hibernian Academy Annual Exhibition for the first time and was awarded the ESB Moran Award and Medal for Outstanding Sculpture.
Her distinctive patinas play an integral part in conveying the characters of her stylized animals brimming with whimsy, playfulness, humour and tenderness.
“My childhood bookshelf has been a great influence in my life. The adventures, hopes and dreams of the little creatures anthropomorphized in the stories of Beatrix Potter, A.A. Milne, Richard Scarry and Kenneth Grahame to name but a few, have given me a sense that anything is possible in a world inhabited by animals who sail rafts, bake pies, drive cars, make cups of tea and head off on adventures!”
For Stephanie, sculpting is all about joy.
Her works appear in private collections and gardens throughout Ireland, the UK, Spain, Germany, Switzerland, Hong Kong, South Africa and the United States.
In 2020/2021 Stephanie was commissioned to create the Lord Mayor of Dublin Awards, the Lord Mayor of Dublin Youth Awards, and the Freedom of the City of Dublin Award.
In 2022 she was commissioned by Dublin Zoo to create a bronze sculpture of a Red Panda as a thank you from the zoo to the people of Ireland and beyond who responded so generously to the Save Dublin Zoo initiative.
