George Petrides
Lineage of the Future
A personal beginning
Born in Athens in 1964 and based between Athens and New York, George Petrides makes sculpture rooted in family memory, migration, and the histories that shape a life. Sulala brings those concerns together in five portraits of people closest to him.
In the artist’s words
“For the series, the highest accolade will be for people to recognize their own families in mine.” — George Petrides
From study to a full-time practice
Petrides studied Classics at Harvard College (B.A., 1985) and earned an M.B.A. and M.A. at Stanford University in 1993. He began studying art part-time in 1996, committed to a full-time practice in 2017, and received a Certificate in Sculpture from the New York Studio School in 2022.
Public work, personal roots
His September 2026 public sculpture overview records 40 works, installed or in progress, across eight countries. Examples of installed work include Refugee-Woman of Smyrna in Neo Psychiko, Athens, and sculpture at Tiffany & Co., The Landmark, New York. These belong to his wider practice; they are not announced hosts of Sulala.
How he works
Petrides begins in clay, develops the form through scanning and digital sculpting, and returns to it by hand after fabrication. The visible surface carries the marks of that process. His subjects remain individuals, even when their scale gives them a public presence.
Learning in the studio
Alongside the New York Studio School, Petrides studied at the Art Students League in New York and the Académie de la Grande Chaumière in Paris. Those experiences form part of the sustained studio training that preceded his move to a full-time sculpture practice.