Spring in downtown Nelson means new sculptures. Each year the city leases several pieces from Castlegar Sculpturewalk with 75 per cent of the lease price going to the artists. The new pieces will be installed any day now.
The Landing, a bronze piece by Nathan Scott of Victoria, will be installed in front of CIBC on the 400 block Baker St.
Scott’s bio states that he “has undergone a dramatic career change – from gold miner in the Yukon to bronze sculptor – with hardly a misstep along the way.” His bronze sculptures “capture motion in his meticulously crafted wildlife pieces,” which have been shown across North America.
Focus by Osamede Obazee will be placed on the north side of the 500 Block of Baker St.
From Benin, now residing in San Francisco, Obazee is “recognized as one of the leading proponents of contemporary African-influenced sculpture,” his bio states. “He carries on a hundreds of years old tradition of metal, wood and stone carvers from central west Africa. Focus portrays an African woman in the throes of the creative process.”
Kootenay Time by Brent Bukowski and Arin Fay will be installed in front of Railtown Coffee.
Bukowski and Fay live in Kaslo. “Working primarily with glass and recycled metal using minimal tools, Bukowski creates intriguing industrial-like works that comment on global patterns of excessive consumption, resource extraction and environmental degradation. Fay’s paintings tend toward the impressionistic/abstract but also follow deliberate themes. Kootenay Time is an imposing sculpture that — using reclaimed materials — portrays a denuded clock, its mechanisms exposed.”
The Walker by Yeins Gómez Sousa will be placed on the south side of the 500 block Baker.
From his bio: “Yeins Gómez Sousa is a Cuban sculptor from Matanzas, just east of Havana. His relative youth belies his experience and knowledge – Sousa is a professor of sculpture at the Professional Art School in Matanzas while continuing to study restoration and conservation at the Higher Institute of Art in Havana.” His works have been exhibited widely in Cuba and he also works in sand and other mediums. The Walker is an life-size abstract figure of a skeletal man.
Eagle Dancer, by father-and-son artists Grant and Clint George from Penticton, will be placed in front of the CPR station in Railtown.
Grant has been an artisan from childhood, creating pieces from metal, wood and leather. Clint, having worked as a tattoo artist for 17 years, has moved on to sculpting in metal and painting. “Eagle Dancer is a visual interpretation of an iconic, important First Nations symbol signifying healing and prayer.”
Affordable public art
The city’s cultural development officer, Joy Barrett, says the sculptures in the downtown are “a real draw for people, particularly children — they love them. It is a very affordable way for the city to have public art because to purchase them you might be looking at maybe $15,000 for one piece, where with this leasing program you get five or six for quite a bit less than that.”
Each year the public art working group, a committee of the city’s cultural development committee, decides on which works to lease.