His early work was really neat - then he found a "niche" and stuck with it. My parents had his sculpture of a phoenix in the front yard for years. It was about 6 feet tall and we kids used to climb on it. It stayed in the yard when they sold the house (it was bedded in umpty-ump feet of concrete) and I don't know what happened to it. The lot was bulldozed for a Monster Mansion, so it went somewhere. Hope they knew it was a Hanson (serve them right if they didn't, philistines.)
Wrt your silly art perfesser, roses are as real as manure piles, and they smell a LOT better!
Wow, I think Hanson's sculptures go in the $300,000+ range now. I liked a lot of Hanson's work, and admired his craftsmanship, but the stuff was just too depressing for me.