Broken Time: Sculpture by Martin Payton

Broken Time: Sculpture by Martin Payton features 30 steel sculptures by local sculptor Martin Payton. The exhibition focuses on Payton's recent work: his sculpture created in the last twenty years represents his most sophisticated improvised compositions. Inspired by New Orleans jazz musicians who maintain African heritage in the form of polyrhythms, chants, and improvisation, Payton maintains the record of use and wear in his material—scrap metal. Payton welds these materials as found, improvising his sparse, lyrical steel sculptures, which are deeply rooted in the modernist tradition. Striking lines, curves and planes are deepened with nuanced layers of meaning rooted in African symbolism, the African American experience, and jazz. 

Born in New Orleans in 1948, Martin Payton currently lives and maintains a studio in Baton Rouge. 

Credit: Exhibition overview from museum website