sculptor
noun
a person who practices the art of sculpture.
sculptor
American
[skuhlp-ter]
/ ˈskʌlp tər /
noun
-
sculptors,
plural
-
Sculptoris
genitive
-
a person who practices the art of sculpture.
-
(initial capital letter) a southern constellation between Phoenix and Cetus.
Sculptor
1
British
/ ˈskʌlptə /
noun
sculptor
2
British
/ ˈskʌlptə /
noun
Other Word Forms
Noun Inflected Forms
Etymology
Origin of sculptor
First recorded before 1625–35; from Latin, equivalent to sculp(ere) “to carve” + -tor -tor
Explanation
An artist who creates three-dimensional works of art is a sculptor. Some sculptors carve designs out of a piece of wood or stone, while others weld slabs of metal together to create their masterpieces. The thing distinguishing a sculptor from other artists is that their work can be viewed from many different sides, instead of being a relatively flat painting or collage. Sculptors today work in just about any medium you can imagine, including clay, fabric, metal, bone, plastic — even sand and ice. Ancient Greek and Roman sculptors created lifelike figures from marble and bronze, some of which you can still see in museums today. The Latin root of sculpture means "to carve."
Vocabulary lists containing sculptor
Florida's B.E.S.T. Common Suffixes: -er, -or
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Example Sentences
Examples are provided to illustrate real-world usage of words in context. Any opinions expressed do not reflect the views of Dictionary.com.
See Examples For:
Visitors can trade $5 for a small black sphinx, a replica of sculptor Lee Lawrie’s Belgian black marble and bronze sphinxes that flank the north staircase on the library’s second floor.
From Los Angeles Times ● Aug. 10, 2026
A scale model by sculptor Adam Matejowski was installed on the site in 2024 as a preview of the giant monument.
From Barron's ● Jul. 27, 2026
His collection was a nod to the American sculptor Lynda Benglis and featured accordion-like dresses, skirts and accessories.
From BBC ● Jul. 9, 2026
When Saint-Gaudens showed a plaster cast of it at the 1900 Paris Exposition, Auguste Rodin, then the most famous sculptor in Europe, stopped before it, removed his hat and stood in silent tribute.
From The Wall Street Journal ● Jul. 2, 2026
In compensation, the sculptor has treated the limited free space atmospherically, yet the figures remain imprisoned in stone.
From "History of Art, Volume 1" by H.W. Janson
Sculptor Nick Elphick said he was left "in shock" while Jones' daughter, Sally, "seemed very upset" by the damage to the bronze statue at his birthplace in Colwyn Bay, Conwy county.
From BBC ● May 20, 2026
Appeared in the April 9, 2026, print edition as 'A Sculptor of Urban Spaces'.
From The Wall Street Journal ● Apr. 8, 2026
Sculptor Omri Amrany, who created the Wade statue with Oscar Léon, is not bothered by the criticism.
From Los Angeles Times ● Oct. 28, 2024
NGC 253 is located about 10 million light-years away in the direction of the constellation Sculptor.
From Science Daily ● Mar. 28, 2024
“See how beautiful this horse is; Leonardo da Vinci alone has created it. Sculptor, fine painter, fine mathematician, so great an intellect rarely does Heaven bestow.”
From "The Mona Lisa Vanishes" by Nicholas Day
For the rest of his life—in contrast to his contemporaries the Color Field painters and industrial-scale sculptors, who required vast studios—he worked in the modest apartment where he kept his own company.
From The Wall Street Journal ● Feb. 25, 2026
Early Renaissance sculptors went to school on works like this, learning from them how to tell a complex story on a flat surface within a circumscribed area.
From The Wall Street Journal ● Oct. 22, 2025
Laura Gardin Fraser, the only woman among the monument sculptors here, designed a powerful double-equestrian sculpture of Lee and Jackson for Baltimore, unveiled in 1948.
From Los Angeles Times ● Oct. 22, 2025
By 1970, sculptors Christo and Jeanne-Claude had just wrapped a million square-feet of coastal Australia in tarpaulin lashed with rope.
From Los Angeles Times ● Oct. 9, 2025
“It is a marvelously small ear, and at the top it is shaped and carved after the fashion in which old sculptors indicated deviltry and vice in their statues of satyrs.”
From "The Devil in the White City" by Erik Larson
They actually orbit each other, and as R Sculptoris dances in a circle, the wind that blows off from it forms a spiral pattern like a garden sprinkler shooting out water.
From Slate ● Dec. 19, 2012
About 7° south-east of α is the red and variable star R Sculptoris; variable from 6·2 to 8·8 magnitude, with a period of about 376 days.
From Astronomical Curiosities Facts and Fallacies by J. Ellard Gore
Definitions and idiom definitions from Dictionary.com Unabridged, based on the Random House Unabridged Dictionary, © Random House, Inc. 2023
Idioms from The American Heritage® Idioms Dictionary copyright © 2002, 2001, 1995 by Houghton Mifflin Harcourt Publishing Company. Published by Houghton Mifflin Harcourt Publishing Company.
