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A Fair Park 1940s pied-à-terre provides occasional refuge for artist George Sellers and gallery space for his architectural ornaments and plaster sculpture. Plaster walls are original architectural embellishment that were carved in clay and made into molds by Sellers. Plaster laurel frame and The Great Face by George Sellers Creative. Sorelle Preveggenti (Prescient Italian Sisters) is a personal sculpture by George Sellers. Gilded wasp on nest by Ely Sellers/ George Sellers, $4,800 at Grange Hall. Pierre Krupp 18th-century harp from Pittet Antiques. A SELLER OF GRYPHON GROTESQUERIE THE FANTASTICAL OEUVRE OF SCULPTOR GEORGE SELLERS G eorge Sellers sits in his Exposition Avenue pied-à-terre in Dallas amongst his gilded bugs and octahedrons, goat-footed desks and zinc white tree twigs, contemplating the route from then to now. "It is circuitous," says the artist the day before heading to New York to install a sculptural extravaganza at the Paramount Hotel's Diamond Horseshoe, the fabled 1930s cabaret currently undergoing a $20 million restoration. "Circuitous, at best." Sellers' designs for the nightclub — a 13-foot jewelencrusted ceiling medallion of resin, wood and steel; an entire room of backlit carved paraffin panels; and a goldleaf proscenium — arrived on West 46th Street ahead of time, in pieces, as much of his work does. For his clientele (Van Cleef & Arpels, Bergdorf Goodman, Barneys New York), Sellers and his Dallas-based team of four or so fabricate decorative art, sculpture and architectural ornament, ship it from his Oak Cliff studio and follow it like transplant surgeons, infusing high-profile spaces with imagination, wit and a touch of the fantastical. The starburst ceiling embellishment was inspired by Bernini's Ecstasy of St. Teresa, in which an angel pierces the saint's heart with a fire-tipped spear, sending her into spiritual bliss. "My eye is drawn to Renaissance decoration and Rococo, and I do love clean and modern, too. I exist between those; it's all in the middle," says Sellers, who studied classical sculpture at Studio Art Centers International in Florence after college. "I also love silly carving, like acanthus leaves, and am always drawn to figurative embellishment, the crazier the better." His work, which also includes collections of home decoration, mystical creatures and tree stumps, is carved from clay, molded in sustainable rubber and cast in plaster. "These pieces are extremely intricate and meticulously crafted, a mix of grotesquerie and beauty," says Jeffrey Lee, owner of Grange Hall, which carries select limited-edition pieces. Despite characterizing his professional route as roundabout, Sellers, 48, seems to have navigated a perfectly direct artistic trajectory — one that has trusted his talent and temperament and recognized possibility in himself, his medium and his environment. A gully creek cut through his family's property in Healdton, Oklahoma. As a child, Sellers found himself playing in it, carving the white clay at the bottom of the ditch. "It was a very isolated southern oil town," he says. "I was the youngest of five, and they all took off and left me in the country. I was usually by myself in the creek." He knew early on, however, that geography wouldn't be a barrier. He rises from the sofa and retrieves a book from a wall of shelves dotted with plaster hands, branches, sea creatures and other feats of whimsy: Thorpe by Mary Dutton, published in 1967 and signed by "Aunt Fudge," who was known for hanging Christmas balls from her ears and spraying her hair silver. "My aunt showed me that you can do something here in this little town and make an impact," Sellers says. His parents were equally bold, living in Singapore, Hong Kong and Sumatra by the time Sellers was studying ceramic sculpture at UT-Arlington. When he visited, he accompanied his mother, who worked with WIC in Indonesia. "Not many people had such a view of other cultures. My parents jumped on those opportunities." In the '90s, after returning to Texas from Italy, where he sculpted in marble, Sellers found representation for his work and developed a base of collectors. In time, he tired of the patron relationship and the emotional demands that it produced. His "angsty figures" — powerful renderings of the human form — are central to his identity as an artist but have given way to less personal work that allows him to be more removed. The transition to commercial art happened by chance in Sarasota, Florida. Sellers walked by the John Ringland mansion, Ca d'Zan, the Venetian Revival residence of The shadowy environs of Sellers' space. B Y PA M E L A K R I P K E . A R T D I R E C T I O N M I C H E L L E AV I Ñ A . P H OTO G R A P H Y S H AY N A F O N TA N A A N D S C O G I N M AYO.