An aerial view shows the the Mountain Bike course at the X-Park at Deodoro Olympic Park ahead of the 2016 Rio Olympics in Rio de Janeiro, Brazil, July 16, 2016. (Photo by Ricardo Moraes/Reuters)

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.

Participants take part in the Mud Day race, a 13km obstacle course, on March 24, 2017 in the Israeli Mediterranean coastal city of Tel Aviv. (Photo by Jack Guez/AFP Photo)

A Dinosaurs makes his way around the course meeting Racegoers who are enjoying racing at Taunton Racecourse, Taunton, Somerset, England on April 10, 2025. (Photo by Phil Mingo/PPAUK/Rex Features/Shutterstock)

Friends (L-R) Katherine Olson, Olivia Carroll and Maron Ross take a memory during the 148th running of the Preakness Stakes at Pimlico Race Course on May 20, 2023. (Photo by Jonathan Newton/The Washington Post)

Sergey, one of the participants of PARTISAN courses, poses for a portrait in an abandoned building in Olgino, St. Petersburg, Russia on November 23, 2016. Sergey came to St. Petersburg from the city of Cheliabinsk to attend an intensive seven-day program. Sergey is a businessman, a traveller and a blogger. His another passion are “men's hobbies”, that's why he participated in the paramilitary courses. (Photo by Alexander Aksakov/The Washington Post)

Waverly Fire's Tell Hanes, left, and Southeast Fire's Trey Wayne, right, jump over freezing water to high five while participating in a Surface Ice rescue technician course on Friday, January 6, 2023, at Holmes Lake Park in Lincoln, Neb. The International Rescue and Relief department at Union college held rescue training course at Holmes Lake for students and local fire departments. (Photo by Kenneth Ferriera/Lincoln Journal Star via AP Photo)

Rescuers work to put out fire outside a damaged residential building hit by recent shelling in the course of Russia-Ukraine conflict in Donetsk, Russian-controlled Ukraine on November 7, 2023. (Photo by Reuters/Stringer)