Edwards, Melvin (1937- ), American sculptor, known for his works of welded steel and other metals. Edwards was born in Houston, Texas. He studied painting at the University of Southern California (USC) and began sculpting in 1960. Edwards received his B.F.A. degree from USC in 1965. He first gained critical attention with a series of sculptures entitled Lynch Fragments, which by 1997 totaled more than 150 individual works constructed since 1963. The sculptures in this series are made using both forged and welded parts of knife sheaths, automotive gears, chains, ball bearings, horseshoes, and other metal. The works, which are each about the size of a human head and hang on a wall, explore themes of violence and incorporate both American and African symbolism.

In 1967 Edwards moved from California to New Jersey and his work shifted away from the manipulated, unpainted metal. A solo exhibition at the Walker Art Center in Minneapolis, Minnesota, in 1968 included geometric shapes painted in red, blue, and yellow. Homage to My Father and the Spirit (1969, Ithaca, New York), an outdoor sculpture at Cornell University, is a large-scale work that incorporates discs and triangles in painted steel. In a 1970 solo exhibition at the Whitney Museum of American Art in New York City, Edwards suspended barbed wire and chains from the ceiling to confront the viewer with the brutality of these materials.

Since the 1970s Edwards has spent time in several African countries studying their art and architecture. One result of his studies is a monumental sculpture at Morgan State University entitled Holiday at Soweto (1976-1977, Baltimore, Maryland). The work is constructed out of steel and consists primarily of three circles, each 2.44 m (8 ft) in diameter. Cutouts in two of the circles are large enough for a person to walk through. According to Edwards, the piece was inspired by the incomparable singing of Billie Holiday, who grew up in Baltimore, and by a 1976 protest against the use of the Afrikaans language in black schools in Soweto, South Africa. Edwards wanted the work to express the great possibilities open to young black people living in Africa and the United States. A later piece, Gate of Ogun (1983, The Neuberger Museum, Purchase, New York), takes its name from the god of metalwork in Nigeria’s Yoruba culture. It, too, combines African and American elements and allows the viewer to walk in and around it. Edwards has also created smaller wall-hung sculptures of brushed stainless steel, which are dedicated to Ogun.