As a child Flavia Robalo dreamt of flying. She dreamed about it at night as well as in the day. She says that being imaginative always entailed living a little in the clouds.

Veronica Fonzo tells us the history of La Polveriera studios, and why she is inspired by centaurs.

Filippo is a student at the Academy of Fine Arts in Carrara who uses new technology to help his village art gallery go virtual, and create a spare key for the local church.

Norwegian artist Julia Vance is inspired by calligraphy and her work has been likened to ‘sculptural minimalistic poetry’.

Guus Jooss is an artist and historian who feels a close link with antiquity. He encourages his students to consider creativity as play is to a child: a matter of life and death.

Young Dutch artist Badriah Hamelink hitchhiked to Pietrasanta in 2007 with a backpack and not much else. Having recently faced a near-death experience, she doubled her determination to focus on art.

Not into stone for stone’s sake, Neil considers himself more a clay modeller. Turning to different materials, he then transforms his clay models into something more permanent.

Cynthia tells the journey of her smaller pieces from caressing the stone, creating an artwork through to sharing an emotion with the collector.

Born on a farm in Dorset, Anne Shingleton has always loved painting animals. In 1980 she came to Florence joining the atelier of a teacher who changed her life.

Trained as an architect Nicolas Bertoux likes to know where his sculpture will live, and why. Unfortunately, sometimes the installation is not so straightforward.