Charles Huntington is no longer with us, but parts of him still shine in towering sculptures throughout the area.
His love for art is built into his 24-foot steel model outside General Mills in Golden Valley. His craftsmanship glows in the polished stainless-steel piece in the beer garden at the Black Forest Inn in Minneapolis. His natural talent is folded into the 17-foot orange-red steel figure at the University of Wisconsin, Eau Claire.
The Minneapolis sculptor who designed more than 100 pieces large and small throughout the region died March 20 from prostate cancer and heart problems at 91. Huntington, called Chuck by friends, was widely known for his abstract geometric sculptures positioned in places like businesses and universities in the area.
"You have to have an ability that just is there," said Beryl Wells Hamilton, Huntington's sculpting assistant and close friend. "I'd say he was born with it."
Huntington, who was Ojibwe, was born in Niagara, Wis., and grew up in Minneapolis before embarking on a wide-ranging life path.
On his 17th birthday, he enlisted in the Navy during World War II, said Wells Hamilton, of Meadowlands, Minn. After returning home, his careers shifted from boiler tender to classic car mechanic to race car driver.
He began to turn car parts and objects he'd find at junkyards into found art sculptures, she said. His profile started to climb as he moved from found objects to working directly in steel and stainless steel, moving toward more abstract forms.
Huntington had twin abilities that lent themselves to sculpting: understanding how things worked and a knack for design, Wells Hamilton said.
