The Tale of the Wolves

By David Hunt

Michael Stutz likes to tell stories about the sculptures he creates. It’s a quiet Friday afternoon in a dimly lit auditorium at NC State University and Stutz, always grinning, is deep into storytelling mode as he shows slides of some of his most compelling work to an audience of design students. The California-based artist is on campus for the unveiling of his latest public art project: three larger-than-life bronze wolves installed at the new “Wolf Plaza,” guarding the approach to the student bookstore and several residence halls.

The sculptures are part of a continuing campus beautification project helped along by the bond referendum of 2000 that allowed NC State to undertake facility construction and renovation projects across campus.

“Here they are,” Stutz declares as an image of the trio fills the screen at the front of the auditorium. “Ready for all sorts of adventures that we can only imagine.”

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With ancestry that is Lumbee, African American and Hungarian Jewish, Dr. Judy Kertesz is the perfect person to help organize a Smithsonian exhibit on the mixed race heritage of American Indians.