Back on Monday, I removed the Camas installation from Halsey. De-installation is always much faster than installation. It took all of 1.5 hrs. The toughest part was finding another screwdriver to unscrew the hinges to the door panels. Normally, I overstock my supply bucket, but on this instance things were a tad bare. I had only one Phillips screwdriver head and it was too small. Fortunately there is a store in town and my #1 helper went and purchased what was needed. I borrowed my sister’s huge truck with canopy for the panels and loaded the camas into the honda. It took another couple of days before it could be unloaded into the garage. Now it’s safe until it can go off for another showing.
Public installations are still something that I find gratifying and I’m looking forward to the next one in 2016. The one portion of this sort of project that I really miss is feedback. Yes, I received a huge amount of kudos and praise from my friends (both artists and art lovers), but lack of connection to the towns folk. The artist talk only solicited about 4 community members. On removal day I did talk a bit with one of the city workers, Hilary, who had been my coordinator for this project. She said the feedback was all favorable and they didn’t receive one complaint (which she found quite surprising, since someone always complains about something). I also had a very nice conversation with a neighbor down the street. He said there were lots of folks who came by, especially at night, to see the piece. He’s already dreaming of turning the vacant post office building next door to the library into a cafe and feature my art. I really enjoyed being a part of Halsey for 3 months, and it was by far my favorite small town.
Below are a few photos passed along from a project through Central Linn Elementary school thanks to Jessi Furlo & Cheryl French, part of the education outreach staff at The Arts Center. Jessi attended my artist talk and took the inspiration and ideas from that into the classroom. The kids worked with wire and book pages to create forms for their tree. Someone built them a very nice stand to support their sculpture. It looks like the kids all had a great time. I have to say it’s pretty cool to have inspired a great group of budding artists!
Sticks, Stones, and Paper Stew Blog 