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.

David Rawcliffe, house and monument steward at the National Trust's Chedworth Roman Villa cleans a Roman mosiac in the new environmentally-controlled conservation shelter on March 19, 2012 near Cirencester, England. Opened this month, the multi-million pound building allows visitors to walk on suspended walkways just above the 1600-year-old Roman floors and to see recently excavated mosaics not seen for 150 years, with more to be uncovered over the coming year. (Photo by Matt Cardy/Getty Images)

Salt-resistant plants grow in sand made up of small fish bones on the shore of the Salton Sea before sunrise in an area where a controversial development would create a new town for nearly 40,000 people on the northwest shore of the biggest lake in California, the Salton Sea, on March 21, 2012 south of Mecca, California. (Photo by David McNew/Getty Images)

Protester Lauren Digioia wears police tape during an Occupy Wall Street protest in Union Square on March 19, 2012 in New York City. Protesters affiliated with the movement are gathering in Union Square today following 73 arrests at a six-month anniversary rally at Zuccotti Park over the weekend. (Photo by Mario Tama/Getty Images)

Two rescued pangolins sit in a basket during a news conference in Bangkok on June 7, 2012. Thai customs rescued 110 pangolins worth about $35,500 that they say were to be sold outside the country as exotic food. The animals, hidden in a pickup truck, were seized at a customs checkpoint in Prachuap Khiri Khan province, south of Bangkok. (Photo by Sakchai Lalit/Associated Press)

A member of the Edo Firemanship Preservation Association balances on top of a bamboo ladder as he performs a ladder stunt during the New Year's fire review conducted by the Tokyo Fire Department at Tokyo Big Sight on January 6, 2009 in Tokyo, Japan. The annual event, featuring various demonstrations of the latest firefighting and emergency rescue techniques, aims to promote the prevention of fire and disaster. (Photo by Kiyoshi Ota/Getty Images)

Two attendees compete in the biggest vape cloud competition at the Vape Summit 3 in Las Vegas, Nevada May 2, 2015. According to new research provided to Reuters, youngsters say that performing tricks is one of the top two reasons they began using e-cigs. (Photo by David Becker/Reuters)

These adrenaline-junkie climbers go to extraordinary lengths, and heights, to take a selfie. Hundreds of metres above the ground, the climbers risk their life and liberty as they scale huge structures and photograph the results. Known as urban exploration, the aim is to find extremely high and almost inaccessible city buildings and reach their dizzying summits. (Photo by Yaroslav Segeda/Solent News)