‘Soaring Stones’ have soared on home
As I discussed a few weeks ago, the sculpture ‘Soaring Stones’ has been removed from its location on Fifth Avenue to make room for the improvements being made to the bus mall. Since the Portlandmall.org website indicated that “alternative locations are being explored for “Driver’s Seat” by Don Merkt, “Tri-Met” (fountain) by Robert Maki and “Soaring Stones” by John Young”, I hoped to find out where the sculpture was going to end up. Well, I found out.
In a comment left at my earlier post, ‘John Young’ indicated that:
Soaring Stones has been permanently removed and taken out of town forever. The city did nothing to try and keep it and so the owner was all too happy to give it back to the artist. This is unfortunate since it appeared to be much loved by Portlanders, appears in hundreds of international guide books in the Portland entries, and was specifically designed for that exact location.
Saddened to hear that Soaring Stones might be gone forever, I contacted the Communications Director for Trimet, Mary Fetsch, asking for details. Ms. Fetsch was kind enough to respond with some additional information.
As suspected, the sculpture was moved because the sidewalk it was sited on will be narrowed to accommodate a shared auto/bike lane in the new mall. Ms. Fetsch also confirmed that Soaring Stones has been returned to the artist, John Young. However, the sculpture was not part of the public collection, but was owned by the owners of Pioneer Place (General Growth). It was apparently their decision to give it back to the artist, although it had been determined that the sculpture would not be relocated on the transit Mall.
Mr. Young is reportedly trying to raise private funds to have the sculpture relocated to the University of Washington, where he teaches. I wish him the best of luck. Even if we can’t enjoy it, it deserves to be on display.
With respect to the other two pieces of public art for which “alternative locations are being explored”, Merkt’s Driver’s Seat will be moved across the street from its current location. Unfortunately, a new site has not been found for the Maki Fountain, due to the need for a site that possesses the appropriate width and slope, and also has enough space for an underground vault. Which means we could be saying goodbye to that piece as well.
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Oh, that sucks. I really did like that sculpture.
That is totally lame. That was the best art downtown. I liked to climb on the lower rocks and sit on them and imagine how cool it would be if I could jump over to the higher ones.
Sad.
Blah. I was hoping it was a temporary move for construction’s sake. Le sigh.
So, since I betcha that we taxpayers paid for that thing through that idiotic government-mandated “percent for art” program, when can we be seeing our refund?