I’ve taken art classes since I was… grasshopper.

Some were drawing classes. Some were painting classes. Some were ceramic and/or sculpture classes. I don’t remember being taught in ANY of them, how, when, or where to sign a three-dimensional piece. In fact, when I was in design school learning to create things for people to buy and use – “products,” I was taught to think of myself as anonymous hands connected to a mind’s eye; the manufacturer could brand, but I daren’t attach my name.

Now that I practice as a sculptor, mostly of figurative work, I’ve noticed (in retrospect) that at no time, in any class, was mentioned my signing and numbering. In painting classes, yes; in sculpting classes, never. I remember an anecdotal story of Michelangelo, I think, sneaking into a Papal chapel to sign a sculpture to assert its provenance.

I wonder:
What ARE the customs, the expectations, the “correct” procedures and content for today’s sculptors. Who teaches these? When? Where?