Tom Harold

Born and raised in Indianapolis, I was always fascinated with mechanical objects. I used to take things apart to see how they worked, and I loved trying to fix things or build simple machines, whether they were Lego, Erector set, or something home brewed with dad’s expert assistance to ensure success.

I didn’t go to art school, selling myself short in my youth and assuming my talent wasn’t up to par. However, my love of mechanics continued to guide my life, and my English and Journalism double major was supposed to get me a job writing for Hot Rod Magazine where I would presumable live out the entirety of my professional career.

At the not-quite-so-young age of 35 I realized I’d not become the writer I wanted to be, nor was I doing something that I passionately believed in. I started a grand search to figure out what that was, assuming that it would likely lead me back to writing. However, a chance encounter with kinetic sculpture at the Indy Children’s Museum proved to change the course of my life, and by age 38 I realized that rolling ball sculpture was my aim. I found I could blend both my desire to be creative with crafting works from metal that actually moved in a most captivating fashion.

I was terrified of the idea of trying to be a full-time artist, as that seemed less than responsible, but I was far too taken with it to set it aside. Ten years later, having learned to weld and cycled through several jobs that would teach me better metal working skills, I left my day job to work full time creating rolling ball sculpture.