They say that when you love something, you should let it go, and that’s how Stratton Hatfield feels about the leaf sculptures he has on display in the latest Masterworks exhibition Taking Shape: Group Show.

Most of his smaller sculptures in the show – moulded on frangipani and nasturtium leaves, were made for his wedding reception at Astwood Park in June.

He and his wife, Claire Peverelli, spent six months making them to be centrepieces at their wedding table.

“It was fun because a lot of our friends would come over to help,” he said. “It was a community effort.”

But now he is definitely ready for goodbye.

“We had a connection to the sculptures, but we are ready for them to leave our apartment,” he said. “The house is really nice now that they are not all over the floor.”

Mr Hatfield started making leaf sculptures back in 2011. He was fascinated by the shape and texture of the leaves he saw in nature, and was trying to reverse engineer them into fossils.

“I am really interested in capturing the forms of all these different leaves around the island, and then exploring different mediums with them,” he said.

For each piece he selects a leaf, such as palmetto, monstera, frangipani or nasturtium, and uses it to create a unique mould that intricately reflects the shape and texture of the leaf.

He pours concrete into the mould in layers to get the desired effect. His work, which he calls “Yart”, a combination of ‘yard and art’, has appeared in shows at Masterworks, the Bermuda National Gallery and the Bermuda Society of Arts.

He and his wife met a few years ago when he was at Brunel University in London studying for a masters in sustainability, entrepreneurship and design. She is an integrative art therapist.

“A friend introduced us,” Mr Hatfield said.

The two bonded over their shared love of art and nature.

Mr Hatfield graduated in 2019 and returned to Bermuda to work in the solar power industry. He is director of development at Be Solar on St John’s Road in Pembroke.

“The solar industry seemed a good fit for me,” he said.

Ms Peverelli was meant to follow him to Bermuda soon after he left London, but the pandemic intervened.

“She moved to Bermuda on the first flight after the lockdown ended,” Mr Hatfield said.

Ms Peverelli is now an outdoor education facilitator for the AgraLiving Institute, a local organisation that educates people on how to grow their own food.

The couple spend a lot of their time working together on leaf sculptures.

“It is wonderful to share the experience, in terms of going through the process,” Mr Hatfield said. “Claire is more detail oriented and has a good eye to make things better and more polished. For me, I am good at executing but sometimes I miss out on little detail.”

It felt special to him to have a partner with whom he could make and share art.

“I love that we found that,” he said.

Mr Hatfield always had a passion for nature.

“It was something I was raised with,” he said. “I grew up in a family that was interested in growing food. My mother, Fiona Hatfield, loves working in the garden.”

He remembered his maternal grandmother, Sheila Gosling, also loved working outdoors.

“She used to mow the lawn at night with the car lights on so she could see,” he said. “She would be wearing a bathing suit and lipstick.”

Mr Hatfield admitted to being a “pain” about helping in the garden when he was little, but he soon grew to enjoy it. Now he and Ms Peverelli grow their own vegetables.

Most of the leaves he uses in his art come from their own yard or neighbourhood.

“I spend a lot of time walking around in nature and just looking at the shape of leaves,” he said. “It is about finding the right leaf to capture and solidify. It has to have good surface area and it has to have a dynamic flow to it and curvature.”

Some leaves are more difficult to mould than others. Monstera, sometimes called ‘Swiss cheese’ leaf, has many holes in it, which can weaken the structure if not reinforced with wire.

Sometimes he has to go a little further afield to find that perfect leaf.

“I am always on the lookout for different things to capture with my art,” he said. “There is a lot of beauty around Bermuda.”

He loves to create work for specific spaces and takes commissions.

“Custom pieces get me excited,” he said. “I was working with a client recently who wanted to do a light fixture sculpture using palm husks. That was a matter of me finding the perfect husk. I was looking for something fresh, raw and more mouldable.”

He spotted what he needed while driving.

“It was on the side of the road,” he said. “Luckily, it was fairly easy for me to park, walk back and grab it.”

He loves that people are now starting to collect his work and put it on their walls.

He hopes that his art will inspire people to feel a greater connection with nature.

“These days, we forget that we are a part of nature,” he said. “It is important to live symbiotically with the environment.”

Mr Hatfield said there is not a lot of focus on sculpture in Bermuda, which makes Taking Shape, unique. Other artists in Taking Shape include Zoë Dyson, Scott King and Liana Nanang. Mr Hatfield said they all have their own distinct approach to sculpture.

Some artists struggle with impostor syndrome, at least at the beginning of their careers, but Mr Hatfield has never had that problem as an artist.

“I am a firm believer that all of us are artists,” he said. “We all have our own way of expressing that.”

The price of his pieces in Taking Shape range from $35 for smaller works up to $400 for the bigger pieces that can weigh as much as 50lbs.

The show is on now in the Rick Faries Gallery at Masterworks until January 10.

For more information: masterworksbermuda.org