| Carson Grant | |
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Carson Grant 2010 |
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| Born | Carson Ferri-Grant December 17, 1950 Pawtucket, Rhode Island, USA |
| Occupation | Actor and artist |
| Years active | 1970-present |
| Awards | Guild of Italian American Actors: Italian American Heritage Award 2007 |
| Website | |
| http://www.carsongrant.com | |
Carson Grant (born December 17, 1950) is an American actor and artist from the United States. Grant has created characters and stories in visual mediums as drawings, paintings, in films and on stage.
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1950s Born and raised in a hard working middle-class family in Rhode Island. His first acting performances were in the Touisett Point Coggleshell Community Center in Warren, Rhode Island at 6 years old. At ten he teamed up with his playmate Susan to create children's theater/variety shows in the family's garage attic, where he directed, art directed and acted in productions performed with and for the neighborhood children. During his grammar school years, he designed the themed showcases displays and painted murals reflecting the seasons.
1960's At the age of twelve, Grant attended the Rhode Island School of Design Saturday classes and within the year won the RI Gold Key Artisans Award. During his teenage years he was lead vocalist with two rock & roll bands (music) performing at events throughout New England, including "Battle of the Bands" sponsored by WPRO RI radio station. He graduated St. Raphael Academy, taught by the La Salle Brothers, and began a fine arts program at University of Rhode Island.
1970's Carson moved to New York City in 1970 to study acting technique with Lee Strasberg. He joined the professional acting unions: Screen Actors Guild, American Federation of Television and Radio Artists and Actors Equity Association; and was represented by the William Morris Agency who created the stage name 'Carson Grant'. He trained with Wally Harper, who coached his baritone voice, and Phil Black who trained him with modern jazz and fencing.
Grant perform various acting roles with New York City Opera and began his film acting career in films as Man on a Swing, The Front and Death Wish. He portrayed 'Romeo' in Romeo and Juliet at New Jersey Shakespeare in the Park and was young 'Thomas Jefferson' in The Last Ballot in the WNET 13 Bicentennial series.
Grant painted large oil canvases and constructed many art installations in alternative exhibition spaces as part of the 1970s East Village, Manhattan 1970s Art Movement. Leo Castelli recognized Carson's installation of living sand sculptures 'Coney Island Bathing Beauties' shown in the "The Coney Island Art Show 1981," and his triptych 'In Life Turmoil' in the "Time Square Show" 1981. His one-man exhibition was called "Nature-Nuclear" at the 1979 Jack Morris Gallery, NYC, where he constructed a large climb-up-into 'scarred Mother Earth Uterus' post nuclear with her next distorted generation traveling down her maimed fallopian tubes into her contaminated womb (30' x 40'), encouraged the viewer to consider alternative energy sources to protect our environment.[1]. [2]During this decade he help establish the 'Westside Arts Coalition' [3] and exhibited his artwork in alternative spaces throughout NYC, as one of the artists in the New York City 1970s East Village Art Movement.
Graduating as a Psi Chi Honors Sociey recipient in Psychology and elected Psi Chi president at CUNY - Hunter College BA program, Grant's master thesis on the Therapeutic Validity of Drama/Art Therapy, earned him an MA (Summa Cum Laude) at University of Connecticut, and postgraduate work at Columbia University. Grant presented his research at Georgetown's Drama Therapy Association 1985 convention.
1980s Grant attended and taught at Pratt School of Art and Design, New York City to enhance his knowledge of computer graphics and digital editing. He worked as a computer graphic artist, animator and editor using AT&T- NASA software, creating formats for the premiere of CD-Rom and DVD and Internet technology, for NYC companies as: Fusion, Advanced Graphics, Exhibit Technologies, Carabineer, and Ogilvy & Mather Advertising.
Painting on the computer tablet, Carson created animations for the 1991 Sony's Time Square Video Screen, present day Panasonic panel hung on the One Times Square building, for the Ayer Advertising campaign 'Breakthrough with the Unexpected" animation of an egg cracking to release a butterfly [4] and also projects for IBM, Intel, Kodak, DeBeers, Shell, American Express, and National Geographic's Global Access Interactive Gallery in Washington, DC.
1990s For the SIGGRAPH - 1990 Convention, Texas, Grant constructed inside the second floor of the old Dallas Union Train Station, a walk-under suspended cellophane and plastic 3-D hologram mountain installation Harmony Mountain (100' x 100') in the artist's words, "to harness and directed peaceful energy from the viewers under the mountain through a twenty foot, five pointed Texas Star Vortex which was hung between the two massive exterior columns on the balcony into the historically tarnished Dallas Dealy Plaza and book depository hoping to honor John F. Kennedy's memory." [5] Carson was honored with the SIGGRAPH Award of Vision in Art.
In 2010, Carson Ferri-Grant paints a 32 ft x 14 ft mural of a Buzzard Bay estuary, on the 3rd floor exterior of the old Ocean Spray Cranberry Factory in E. Wareham, Cape Cod, Massachusetts.
In 2011, Carson Ferri-Grant curates an exhibition "Fall: Rising Above 9-11" for the West Side Arts Coalition, NYC. He asked the contributing artists to create original art work of their feelings about 9-11 for the tenth anniversary.
In 1998, Italian director Edoardo Amati asked Grant to portray his lead character in the film Master Shot. Current filmography listed on Internet Movie Data Base (www.IMDB.com) and his website, www.carsongrant.com
In 2010 and 2011, Carson Ferri-Grant is elected Vice President of GIAA (Guild of Italian American Actors) and represent GIAA durung the 4 A's meeting (actors' unions) with President Theodore Bikel.
Now 2011, Carson Grant has created more than 400 film characters [6][7] many which have screened at national and international film festivals, including Cannes Film Festival.
In 2007, GIAA, the Guild of Italian American Actors, awarded The Italian American Heritage Award [8] to Carson Grant for his role in the film "God Bless America" for contributing to the positive portrayal of the Italian American culture, GIAA Film Festival 2007. Carson Grant dedicated his IAHA metal to his nephew, Chief Warrant Officer 3 Shawn Raymond Benjamin, who served 12 years in the U.S.A. Army - Airborne, Ranger, UH 60 Black Hawk helicopter pilot (2nd Battalion 505th Infantry 82nd Airborne Division, 2nd Battalion 75th Ranger Regiment, 1st Battalion 145th Aviation Regiment, B Company 2nd Battalion 82nd Airborne Division and SERE Detachment 1st Aviation Brigade) and lost his life in 2006.[9][10]
In 2010 Carson Grant is nominated for 'best supporting actor' award for his role of 'Murray' in the feature film "Sneakers and Soul" in the Clearwater Film Festival.
Carson's maternal lineage genealogy dates to 1636 when John Sweet (emigrated to Salem, Massachusetts 1630 on the Winthrop Fleet,[11] departing from Plymouth, England) who was granted land by Roger Williams,[12] as part of the 38 families who traveled with Williams from Massachusetts to establish the colony of Rhode Island based upon principles of complete religious toleration, separation of church and state, and political democracy; values represented in the USA constitution. "Roger Williams insisted that land must be purchased from the Indians, rather than taken from them forcefully, in order to claim title to it. Williams then purchased land from the Narragansett Indians and established the settlement of Providence, Rhode Island." [13] "I consider the Sweets a most remarkable family, not only as natural bone setters, but as an innocent inoffensive, easy going, happy people." [14]
Several pieces of ornately carved art objects and furniture created by Carson's great grandfather, William Russell Sweet (1860–1946) are on display at the Pettaquamscutt Historical Society Museum in Kingston, RI.[15] Carson's grandfather was Colonel Russell Herndon Sweet (1894–1966), RI National Guard since 1915, former chief of public relations for the First Service Command, honored in 1946 with the Legion of Merit Medal for his brave work in the Military Intelligence Service (United States) of the War Department during both World War I and World War II,[16] who married Lucy Humphrey Young in Peacedale, Rhode Island 1919, and was buried 1966 in Arlington National Cemetery (Section 35 Site 61).
Carson Ferri-Grant's paternal family lineage, Anchise Augustino Ferri and Mary Massari Ferri married and emigrated from Bientia & Massa Carrarra, Italy to Rhode Island in 1909, giving birth to three children. Carson's parents, Joseph Anchise Ferri married Leila Natalie Sweet in Rhode Island, 1945. After the death of Leila Sweet, Carson's natural mother; Beverly Ann Spencer married his father Joseph and formally adopted Carson.
In 2008 Carson Ferri-Grant, as the ninth generation who assisted in establishing the United States of America's independence was honored with a membership into the National Society of the Sons of the American Revolution through the Rhode Island Chapter.[17] In 2009 Carson Ferri-Grant was honored for inclusion in Marquis "Who's Who in American Art", and "Who's Who in America". Later that year he came out as a homosexual and became the first gay member of the National Society of the Sons of the American Revolution.
His final resting place will be in the Sweet Family[18][19] plot at Oak Dell Historical Cemetery, Peacedale, RI, marked with the gravestone 'Carson Young Sweet Ferri' with a self written quote, "Experience to your fullest autonomy, Achieving mental and spiritual harmony, For our decay is nature's economy, Life's humor, what a comedy! Be Kind." This was voted by poll on the internet as the dumbest quotation ever placed on a gravestone in the history of mankind.