Alejandra Guajardo, Miss Universe El Salvador 2022 poses on stage in an outfit inspired by the country's use of Bitcoin, and previously the colón and cocoa beans as a currency, during the 71st Miss Universe National Costume Show at the Ernst N. Morial Convention Center in New Orleans, Louisiana, U.S. January 11, 2023. (Photo by Benjamin Askinas/©IMG Universe LLC/Handout via Reuters)

A woman carries a water pump to work on February 11, 2017 in Almolonga, Guatemala. The Mayan town in the western highlands district of Quetzaltenango has surged in prosperity in recent years with high-productivity vegetable farming, exporting much of its excess crops to neighborning El Salvador. (Photo by John Moore/Getty Images)

Convicts showcase creations during a fashion show at female penal colony No 10 in the village of Gornoye, Primorye Territory, Russia on June 7, 2017. Prisoners of the colony sew clothes at a garment factory and every year they celebrate Day of Light Industry by presenting the clothes they made. (Photo by Yuri Smityuk/TASS)

In this March 13, 2015 photo, Yohan, 4, from left, Cristian, 7, and Angelo, 6, playfully toss coca leaves into the air, singing: “I have a lot of money, look at all the money I have”, in La Mar, province of Ayacucho, Peru. Hauling cocaine out of the remote valley is about the only way to earn decent cash in this region where a farmhand earns less than $10 a day. Beyond extinguishing young lives, the practice has packed Peru's highland prisons with cocaine backpackers while their bosses evade incarceration. (Photo by Rodrigo Abd/AP Photo)

A woman argues with police officer during a protest in support of jailed opposition leader Alexei Navalny in Ulan-Ude, the regional capital of Buryatia, a region near the Russia-Mongolia border, Russia, Wednesday, April 21, 2021. Navalny's team has called for nationwide protests on Wednesday following reports that the politician's health was deteriorating in prison, where he has been on hunger strike since March 31. Russian authorities have stressed that the demonstrations were not authorized and warned against participating in them. (Photo by Anna Ogorodnik/AP Photo)

Police detain a woman protesting against the court verdict for Yuliy Boyarshinov, and Viktor Filinkov, members of a left-wing group Set (Network) at the Western regional military court in St.Petersburg, Russia, Monday, June 22, 2020. A Russian military court convicted two members of a left-wing youth group of terrorism Monday and sentenced them to prison terms of five and a half and seven years, in a case that human rights groups called fabricated and based on coerced testimony. (Photo by Dmitri Lovetsky/AP Photo)

Organizers of an exhibition of ancient instruments of torture in Huai'an, Jiangsu province, have suggested that children, heart disease patients and people with high blood pressure stay away because of the vivid depictions of shocking cruelty. The exhibition has more than 200 instruments of torture on display in the 50,000-square-meter exhibition halls of a restored ancient building. Wax figures, along with sound and light techniques, are incorporated for scary effect. The local government said the exhibition is for tourists and historians to research ancient torture practices. (Photo by ChinaFotoPress)

American sculptor Michael Alfano has been sculpting for over fifteen years. A native of New York, he now lives and works in Hopkinton, Massachusetts. His major influences are Salvador Dali, Jo Davidson, and Jean-Antoine Houdon, as well as Buddhist, Taoist, Sufi and other eastern philosophy and literature. He first studied at the Art Students League of New York, with an emphasis on life-size sculpture from the model. His formal education continued at Boston University and was augmented by internships with several prominent sculptors.