{"id":764609,"date":"2026-07-15T15:51:13","date_gmt":"2026-07-15T15:51:13","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/764609\/"},"modified":"2026-07-15T15:51:13","modified_gmt":"2026-07-15T15:51:13","slug":"john-pahlas-forges-a-unique-artistic-path-through-metal-madison-magazine","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/764609\/","title":{"rendered":"John Pahlas forges a unique artistic path through metal | MADISON MAGAZINE"},"content":{"rendered":"

Metalworking and art are a kind of creative inheritance for John Pahlas.\u00a0<\/p>\n

The steel sculptor grew up in Ripon, receiving a rich, hands-on education in blacksmithing, forging and welding through his parents\u2019 business, Metalworks, which built custom, traditionally made metal furnishings and sculptures for customers across the country. He remembers helping with monotonous tasks like flattening, cleaning or cutting pieces of metal.\u00a0<\/p>\n

\u201cI was doing really remedial, boring labor,\u201d says Pahlas, \u201cbut after I did a certain amount of work, I could play.\u201d\u00a0<\/p>\n

He learned to weld at 12 and continued to hone his skills before earning a BFA from the University of Wisconsin\u2013Oshkosh. Today, he works at Center Ground Studios<\/a> in Mount Horeb, which he co-owns with his partner, Heidi Clayton, who is a potter.\u00a0<\/p>\n

Since moving to the Madison area in 2013, he\u2019s accomplished a lot. He created a sculpture for the lobby of the Duluth Trading Co. headquarters in Mount Horeb, has multiple pieces displayed on Epic Systems\u2019 campus in Verona and regularly works with the Madison Children\u2019s Museum. But he\u2019s most proud of finding his way back to the sense of creative freedom he felt while experimenting with metal in his parents\u2019 shop.<\/p>\n

\u201c[As a child], there\u2019s that sense of play that\u2019s generated strictly by wonder. \u2026 It\u2019s not muddled by adult-ism,\u201d he says, referring to the anxieties and pressures he\u2019s struggled with as an adult. \u201cHow can I disengage with all of the boundaries that my adult mind has built up?\u201d\u00a0<\/p>\n

This year, he feels like he\u2019s finally found a way to answer that question\u2009\u2014\u2009but this time, he has decades of skill and experience to draw from, too.\u00a0<\/p>\n

In other words, after a lot of work, it\u2019s time to play.<\/p>\n


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Pahlas\u2019 main tools are his welder and his angle grinder. \u201cI use the welder to add and the grinder to subtract,\u201d he says.<\/p>\n

Photos by Christine Dopp<\/p>\n

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The front lawn of Center Ground Studios is something between a sculpture garden and a scrapyard. Early in his career, Pahlas raided machine shop dumpsters and scrapyards to find metal\u2009\u2014\u2009now scrap metal appears, almost magically, at his doorstep, thanks to Mount Horeb\u2019s arts-friendly community. \u201cI\u2019ve got my scrap fairies,\u201d he says. \u201cIt takes a little village.\u201d<\/p>\n

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Recently, Pahlas has been creating a series of figures resembling bombed buildings. It\u2019s his way of responding to the barrage of violent and devastating imagery shared online. He describes the sculptures as votives\u2009\u2014\u2009objects that act as offerings or memorials. \u201cWe\u2019re living in a time of constant conflict,\u201d he says. \u201cI can do the artist\u2019s timeless civic duty of trying to help people through this mess the only way I know how.\u201d<\/p>\n

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Pahlas\u2019 main tools are his welder and his angle grinder. \u201cI use the welder to add and the grinder to subtract,\u201d he says.<\/p>\n

Photos by Christine Dopp<\/p>\n

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The front lawn of Center Ground Studios is something between a sculpture garden and a scrapyard. Early in his career, Pahlas raided machine shop dumpsters and scrapyards to find metal\u2009\u2014\u2009now scrap metal appears, almost magically, at his doorstep, thanks to Mount Horeb\u2019s arts-friendly community. \u201cI\u2019ve got my scrap fairies,\u201d he says. \u201cIt takes a little village.\u201d<\/p>\n

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Recently, Pahlas has been creating a series of figures resembling bombed buildings. It\u2019s his way of responding to the barrage of violent and devastating imagery shared online. He describes the sculptures as votives\u2009\u2014\u2009objects that act as offerings or memorials. \u201cWe\u2019re living in a time of constant conflict,\u201d he says. \u201cI can do the artist\u2019s timeless civic duty of trying to help people through this mess the only way I know how.\u201d<\/p>\n

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From\u00a0the Artist:\u00a0John Pahlas<\/p>\n

Early Memories\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0<\/p>\n

Our dinner table was more of a drafting table. It was blueprints instead of a tablecloth. My mom would be working on a clay bust in the corner, and then she\u2019d have a draft of a railing out on the table, and we\u2019d be eating hot dogs on top of it.\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0<\/p>\n

First Inspiration\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0<\/p>\n

I like H.R. Giger, the Swiss artist who designed the concept for the \u201cAlien\u201d movie with Ridley Scott.\u200a\u2026\u2009I started to see the piles of metal in my dad\u2019s shop as these gnarly, surreal, biomechanical things. It was [my] origin of falling in love with art that was part of a dark, sci-fi fantasy world.\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0<\/p>\n

Push and Pull\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0<\/p>\n

The tug-of-war I\u2019m working with right now\u200a\u2026\u200a[is that] I have to build this thing that is for me\u2009\u2014\u2009[it\u2019s] not only cathartic, but [it\u2019s] like my identity\u2009\u2014\u2009and then I have to immediately put a price tag on it and then haggle with someone in a tent all summer.\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0<\/p>\n

Long Journey\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0<\/p>\n

For a long time, my work has been shadowed by these negative emotions and anxieties that I\u2019ve had to come to terms with.\u200a…\u200aIt takes a lot to get to a playful place, where I can come in here and make something that\u2019s fun.\u00a0<\/p>\n

John Pahlas | @centerground.studios<\/a> | centergroundstudios.com<\/a><\/p>\n

Anna Kottakis is a contributing editor to Madison Magazine<\/p>\n

\u200bCOPYRIGHT 2026 BY MADISON MAGAZINE. ALL RIGHTS RESERVED. THIS MATERIAL MAY NOT BE PUBLISHED, BROADCAST, REWRITTEN OR REDISTRIBUTED.<\/p>\n


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