I finally saw the point of the weird statue in the town square

I've walked past that big, rusted metal sculpture in the middle of Oakwood Park for years and just thought it was ugly. Yesterday, the sun hit it at a low angle around 5 PM, and the shadows it cast on the pavement made a perfect map of the town's old creek beds, the ones they paved over in the 1950s. It was a total 'aha' moment that the artist built a local history lesson right into the thing. Has anyone else had a public art piece suddenly make sense like that?

3 comments

3 Comments

markt231d ago

Man, that makes me wonder how many of these pieces only work in bad weather, like when it's raining or foggy.

michael_jenkins391d ago

But that just makes it a gimmick for tourists.

clark.morgan1d ago

The old water fountain in Grant Plaza has a ring of tiles with what looked like random chips and cracks. Turns out, if you stand on the north side at noon during the summer solstice, the shadows line up with those marks to show the exact date the plaza was dedicated. It's a hidden sundial. Most public art gets ruined when people only look at it one way, in the middle of the day. That artist knew we needed to be forced to see things at a specific time to get the full story.