January 25, 2013
October 30, 2012
"WHERE THE EARTH AND THE SKY MEET" : Installed at Oklahoma City City Hall, OK
Downtown Oklahoma City has a
brand new sculpture in their public art collection by Phillip K. Smith, III!
Last week the 26-foot tall,
4-foot diameter steel tower got packed up, loaded on a truck for its journey
from Indio, and was installed in the park in front of City Hall. Thanks to careful planning and extraordinary
fabrication by our friends at White’s Steel and new friends at Wynn
Construction serving as the installation crew, the four segments of the piece
were unloaded, unpacked, and precisely installed at the site in only a few
hours! Special thanks to Rusty and his
crew from Wynn for their skill, precision, and enthusiasm.
The piece is within sight of
the Oklahoma City Museum of Art, which hosted Phillip for an informal talk
about the sculpture held on the Museum’s roof deck on Thursday evening. An image noting Where the Earth and the Sky
Meet made the Metro section of The Oklahoman, OKC’s lead newspaper the next
day, and Phillip was also interviewed by a local television station, which will
be edited and broadcast soon.
Thanks to Whitney Cross of
the OKC Museum of Art, Kristy Yager from the City, and particularly to Robbie Kienzle, the Office of Arts and
Cultural Affairs Liason, who was very helpful in coordinating publicity and
getting the word out!
The many facets of the piece
as it rises into the skyline are increasingly covered with mirror-polished
stainless steel, which gives a range of reflections, from clouds, the spectrum
of the colorful sky, and also from trees and the different surrounding buildings
of the downtown plaza. Moving around the
piece, as well as viewing it from different vantage points in nearby buildings,
really brings out the changes in color and shimmer from the reflective
faces. It’s also fun to see that the
detailed renderings, done by Burzeen Contractor throughout the design process,
are remarkably true to the photos of the actual, completed sculpture.
It was especially
rewarding to see that people from the community were taking their pictures with
the new sculpture by the next morning after installation!
The precast concrete base ring and lights will be installed (both in-ground at the base and inside the piece, which will wash colored light up through the voids), and the park's landscape will be renovated in Spring 2013, so stay tuned for updated photos, and also visit the www.PKS3.com website.
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