2024Prize
International Sculpture Prize
World Sculpture Institute, Geneva
About the artist
TheHand
BehindtheStone
For over four decades, Atelier Veyra has produced works that exist at the threshold of figure and landscape — hand-finished in marble, cast in bronze, and placed in collections spanning eighteen countries.
Biography
Alifeshaped
bystone.
Born in the mountains of northern Italy, the artist grew up surrounded by quarries and the inherited craft of stone-cutting. By the age of twelve, a first small relief had been carved from a discarded block — a gesture that would quietly define an entire life.
Training under master sculptors in Florence and later at the École des Beaux-Arts in Paris, the work developed a language that fused classical European sculpture with a deeply personal abstraction — rooted in silence, in the weight of material, in what the stone itself chooses to reveal.
"The stone always knows more than the sculptor. The work is an act of listening."
By the late 1990s, commissions arrived from private collectors in Geneva and New York, followed by institutional acquisitions that cemented the studio's reputation for works that age with the same grace as the buildings that house them.
Heritage & craftsmanship
Rootedin
tradition.
The atelier's methods reach back centuries. Every piece begins with a direct dialogue between sculptor and raw block — no digital intermediaries, no mechanical replication. Only time, the chisel, and an inherited understanding of material.
- Direct carving — no models, no mechanical intermediaries
- Traditional Italian wet-stone polishing by hand
- Lost-wax bronze casting with independent artisan foundries
- Site-responsive commissions from raw block to installation
- Surfaces finished entirely by hand — no CNC, no replication
Artistic philosophy
Permanenceistheonlytrueluxury.Stonedoesnotlie.
The atelier operates from a single conviction: a work of sculpture should outlast the moment of its making. Every decision — material, scale, surface, placement — is made against the measure of decades, not seasons.
Influences range from Brancusi's reverence for form to the ancient Greek kore tradition — yet the work remains wholly contemporary: spare, architectural, and deeply felt.
- 37+
- Years of practice
- 18
- Countries collected
- 64
- Private commissions
- 11
- Public institutions
Recognition
Collected
bytheworld.
Awards, permanent acquisitions, and international exhibitions spanning four decades of practice.
2022Honour
Lifetime Achievement in Stone
European Academy of Arts, Florence
2019Award
Best Monumental Commission
Architecture & Material Forum, Paris
2017Exhibition
Collector's Choice — Sculpture
Art Basel, Basel
2015Acquisition
Permanent Collection Acquisition
Musée des Beaux-Arts, Lyon
2011Prize
Prix de Sculpture
Académie des Beaux-Arts, Paris
Milestones
Landmarks
instone.
The first chisel falls
The atelier is founded in a converted mill outside Turin. A single marble block. A commission for a chapel threshold that takes eighteen months to complete.
Paris — the second education
A residency at the Cité Internationale des Arts opens the work to monumental scale. The first bronze is cast. Six sculptures enter private collections across France and Switzerland.
The first public work
A ten-metre granite installation is unveiled in the forecourt of a civic museum in Lyon — the atelier's first work in permanent public view.
Museum acquisition
A monumental marble form enters the permanent collection of a major European institution, defining the studio's architectural scale in cultural contexts.
The New York commissions
Back-to-back private residential commissions in Manhattan and the Hudson Valley mark the studio's entry into the North American market.
Architecture & Material Prize
A monumental site commission for a Parisian cultural centre wins the Architecture & Material Forum Prize — the first sculptor to receive the honour.
Global commissions
Private, civic, and cultural patrons on four continents collaborate with the atelier on pieces shaped for generations, not seasons.