Sweeting, Nicole

Nicole Sweeting (born 1973, Nassau, Bahamas) became an artist rather accidentally, after happily spending eleven years teaching Language Arts in the Government School System of the Bahamas.  In 2005, an artist visited the school where she was teaching to present his portfolio, and Sweeting was enthralled, striking up a long conversation about process and material.  Her experience with the visiting artist inspired her develop the artistic leanings that she had set aside since grade school.  

Sweeting pushed herself to focus on her personal artistic development while continuing her work as a teacher, and simultaneously looking after her children and family.  She confesses to spending many late nights at the kitchen table, determined to one day find a way to pursue a career as an artist.   During this period, Sweeting explored various mediums, but the discovery of clay was the catalyst for one motivating ambition: to study and harness three dimensionally, all the beauty of the human form in collaboration with the beauty of her country and culture.   

Sweeting's first body of work was a series of studies of the human figure, and she presented several of these works in the group show, First All Ceramic Exhibition (2009), where they were snapped up by awestruck collectors.  Following this unexpected success, she was commissioned in 2010 to produce her first bronze, a monumental work of Junkanoo figures at Nassau International Airport.  

With funding from the airport project, Sweeting retired from teaching and now works as a full time artist.  She is currently working on a new body of work in clay and bronze inspired by Junkanoo, a compelling part of personal history as her father was an acknowledged Junkanoo legend.  She finds that "the excitement of the event serves as an endless source of inspiration", made even more fascinating by the challenges of the bronze casting process.