Born in the United States in 1986, J McDonald studied architecture before founding a high-end metal fabrication studio in New York, where he produced technically complex works for leading artists and designers while independently pursuing sculpture. In 2018, he began merging these parallel practices with his first furniture pieces, leading to the creation of Studio J McDonald, now based between Brooklyn and Accord, New York.
McDonald’s work exists at the intersection of sculpture, furniture, and architecture, and explores tensions between intuition and rationality, the natural and the constructed, the analog and the digital. His pieces fuse strict geometric logic with gestural, organic forms. Drawing on his deep expertise in metalworking and craftsmanship, he balances formal precision with textural spontaneity: metals offer structural clarity and order, while resins and plasters offer complexity, softness, and visible traces of the hand.
This dialogue between order and chaos reflects his core preoccupation: the contradictions inherent in the human condition and our uneasy relationship with nature. His works often appear animated or alive: mirrors ripple, tables lean, volumes erode or distort, challenging assumptions about stability, function, and form. For McDonald, each object becomes a perceptual tool, inviting viewers to reimagine their relationship to their environment.
His inspirations range from insect architecture and geological processes to classical geometry and the subconscious. Through a process grounded in experimentation and refinement, he moves fluidly between digital and analog processes to produce sculptural works that redefine how we inhabit and interpret the material world.
McDonald’s work has been exhibited internationally and featured in design publications and critical essays.
