The son of an Air Force officer, Colonel Clarence Horton II and Ann French, Walt was born in 1949. From a tender age he always had a way of making people smile, so it wasn’t a surprise when he chose cartooning as his first career. Walt went to the University of Colorado on a track scholarship in 1968, but his academic education wasn’t what prepared him for his life as an artist; that just came naturally. With a lot of hard work and learning as he went, an innate propensity to draw flourished.

After studying for one year at the University of Colorado, where he met his wife, Peggy, he decided that formal schooling wasn’t for him. The couple left the United States in the middle of the 1970’s for a 17-year stint performing missionary work in Brazil and Bermuda. The family grew to include two very adventurous boys, Jesse and Benjamin. It was here that Walt’s cartooning matured and an advertising business specializing in humorous illustration became wildly successful. Horton became fluent in Portuguese and Spanish while intensely watching the features and body language of the people with whom he was working.
“I like people and I’ve never met someone I didn’t like once I got to know them. I enjoy studying people’s facial expressions and there are thousands of them. Each one means something different. These gestures are important to human communication and yet I feel most people have lost the ability to understand each other through facial mobility”

It wasn’t until Walt reached his mid-forties when sculpture entered his life. Once that door opened it didn’t take long for the three-dimensional world of bronze sculpture to become his passion. He could still make people smile, grin and laugh out loud, but now it was a different medium and he could have twice as much fun doing it.

“I’ve always liked making people smile and laugh so cartooning has been great for me. My work has been translated into over 100 languages and published on every continent around the world. It wasn’t until my family and I returned to the United States in 1993 that I became interested in sculpting. I always had a love for it, but I wasn’t sure if I could make a living at it,” Horton recounts.

Observing body language, particularly the many subtle nuances of facial expressions, is one of Walt Horton’s special talents. His love of capturing emotion-filled human gestures in bronze is reflected in his series of sculptures centered around children engaged in a variety of simple and adventuresome activities.
“Children’s eyes are the most critical,” he observes. “I’ve seen some sculptors create children who look possessed or spaced out. Many of the eyes lack feeling that should be there. I take a great deal of time with the eyes. During the process of my first child sculpture, I did the eyes 70 or 80 times before they were right.”
Horton begins each piece with a story so he can isolate what emotion he will be portraying. While his earlier figures focused on one child alone, he is currently exploring the combination of child with animal and enjoying the prospect of challenges ahead.
“Working with children and animals has pushed me toward studying anatomy,” he confides. “This is my biggest challenge right now and a dream coming true. I’ve always wanted to study it, but haven’t gotten around to it until now. I want to know where every muscle starts and ends.”
Horton’s bronze children are alive with expression. Whether a young boy is reading a childhood story to his favorite teddy bear or a little girl is encountering a wild moose during a walk in the woods, each child communicates emotions felt at the moment of experience.
“There is a genuineness and innocence with kids,” Horton explains. “They are so much more real than grown ups. I have found that when adults view my work, they often fell moved and reconnected with memories of childhood.”

To the surprise of everyone Walt passed away in his sleep on March 28th 2010. He’s greatly missed by all who had the pleasure of knowing him. His art is still with us and still does the job Walt intended, to make the world a happier place.