This summer, Harold Grinspoon’s sculptures will appear at prominent venues throughout the Berkshires, including Sculpture at The Mount in Lenox and at Chesterwood’s Global Warming/Global Warning! in Stockbridge .There, his sculpture “Olympus” will remain on view for the next two years. The sculpture that appears here, “Dinosaur,” is at the Norman Rockwell Museum through October as part of its Hidden Worlds and Wonders exhibit. Grinspoon is a late-blooming creative force, able to go big and bold as a sculptor and also intimate and subtle as a poet, another way he expresses his artistic vision. The BJV asked him a few questions about his recent endeavors via email.

You’ve described your artistic awakening as having taken place in 2014, when a fallen tree in your yard shifted your “whole perception of life, mortality, immortality, beauty, and form.” You transformed that cherry tree into your first sculpture, ‘The Beauty of Nature,’ and in the years since, you have produced more than 140 works of art. How has working as a visual artist for these past 11 years further shifted your perceptions?

It’s great to have a creative outlet – that you can take a thought or idea and build it into something physical and beautiful. I have a vivid imagination that keeps on moving. It’s wonderful to have an outlet to be able to express that with. I do the same thing with poetry.

What would you like people to consider when they encounter your sculptures currently on view at The Mount, Chesterwood, and the Norman Rockwell Museum?

I would like people to experience joy and happiness, and to smile, and feel uplift. That’s the way I feel when I make the sculptures. I love the creativity of putting it together from the barest materials. And I hope they enjoy the beauty.

While your artwork is abstract, your poetry can be concrete and direct. I admire your lines: “Perhaps you have a chance to look back over your shoulder / And see how you spent your life. / Does that bring tears to your eyes? / Hold on. Not so quick.” Most anyone reading that line, if they’re being honest, will find it relatable and possibly (necessarily?) a little wounding. What does it mean to you in the context of your own life experience?

That line is a very personal line because as I stop and reflect, there are many years when I was not cognizant or aware of the essence of life. I feel so blessed today that I am very significantly aware of who I am, and my ability to sort out my thoughts and move into a very positive experience.

The image shows Harold Grinspoon with BJV Editor Albert Stern at the July 12 opening of "Hidden Worlds and Wonders" exhibition at the Norman Rockwell Museum in Stockbridge. They are standing in front of "Dinosaur."