History of Clayton Public Art
Source: City records; Internet search
ALPHABETICAL LIST
Clayton Caryatid
Dancing Chairs
FM6 Walking Jackman
Folke Filbyter
Man On A Horse
Shoe of Shoes
Still Point
The Uncertainty of Ground State Fluctuation
Uzu Maki #6
Venus Victorious
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Clayton Caryatid
...by Howard Ben Tre
Location: The Plaza in Clayton
Address: 150 Carondelet Plaza - Clayton, MO 63105
Material: Cast low-expansion glass, patinated bronze and polished granite
Owner: THF Realty
The materials were selected to reflect the character of the Plaza in Clayton. The sculpture is surrounded by a ring of granite benches located within a paved field, allowing the public to sit and enjoy the piece.
Ben Tre is recognized worldwide for his unique sculptures and large scale works of art for public and private spaces. His work is exhibited in more than 85 museums and public collections worldwide. He has exhibited at Laumeier Sculpture Park and his Structure 37 is a permanent part of the Saint Louis Art Museum's collection.
References:
Location Map
Howard Ben Tre Biography
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Dancing Chairs
...by Rod Baer
Location: Moved to Clayton School District in 2001
Address: 7530 Maryland Avenue - Clayton, MO 63105
Material: Welded and painted steel
Tilted, angled, back-to-back, and sideways–red and blue chairs dance
in pairs in a long row suggesting that perhaps we might want to take
part in the frolic. Commissioned by Arts in Transit and the Art Fair
in collaboration with the Clayton Art Commission, this lively sculpture
tumbles across a lawn between the playing fields and district school
buildings.
References:
Location Map
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FM6 Walking Jackman
...by Ernest Trova
Location: Southwest corner of N. Brentwood Boulevard and Maryland Avenue
Address: 98 N Brentwood Boulevard - Clayton, MO 63105
Material: Stainless steel
Year completed: 1985
Dimensions: 9'2" H, 15' W 15' D
Owner: Philip Samuels Fine Arts
Donor: Philip Samuels
The artist was born in St. Louis, MO in 1927. He died in 2009.
Streamlined, poised in space, the six almost life-size figures
radiate from acube–the shiny surfaces capture the ever-changing street life. The sculpture explores Trova’s falling
man motif that he began developing the 1960s. Featureless, without arms, the
figures construct a dramatic space that we are invited to enter. The group of six figures, placed atop a
tiered black granite base, radiate from a central cube, with three heads down and three heads upright. The
sculpture is a later rendition of Trova's Falling Man series. This piece
is one in a series of nine.
References:
Location Map
Wikipedia Ernest Trova
St. Louis Walk of Fame
New York Times Obituary
St. Louis Post Dispatch Article 3/15/09
St. Louis Post Dispatch Article 3/10/09
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Folke Filbyter
...by Carl Milles
Location: Clayton City Hall
Address: 10 N. Bemiston Avenue - Clayton, MO 63105
Material: bronze
Date of Dedication: 1928
Owner: On loan from St. Louis Art Museum
Folke Filbyter was introduced in an episode in the Swedish author and Nobel Laureate Verner von Heidenstam's novel Folkungaträdet. From the plaque at the sculpture:
"Swedish legend portrays Folke Filbyter as the pagan founder of the Folkung Dynasty. His grandson was kidnapped by Christian monks.
Folke spent 25 years searching for him on horseback and later find him in the King's service.
Milles depicts this quest by showing the terrified horse fording a treacherous stream and a frightened Folke
counterbalancing the movement"
References:
Location Map
Waymarking.com
Carl Milles wikipedia
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Man on a Horse
...by Fernando Botero
Location: Intersection of Wydown and Hanley
Address: Clayton, MO 63105
Material: bronze
Owner: On loan from Gateway Foundation
The statue is constructed in bronze by Colombian artist Fernando Botero. The dimensions are 230(w) x 160(d) x 350(h)
and the weight is 1.25 tons. The identity of of the rider and horse is unknown. The statue was created by the Colombian artist in 1999.
Botero's bronzes present his characteristic world of swollen forms and he has been asked many times about the
origins of his puffed-up personalities. "My subject matter is sometimes satirical," Botero has said of his works.
"These `puffed-up' personalities are being `puffed' to give them sensuality ... In art, as long as you have ideas
and think, you are bound to deform nature. Art is deformation. There are no works of art that are truly realistic."
Botero's cherished concept "art is deformation" is based on his belief that art is to transform reality. He
deforms as an attempt to impart sensuality to objects, thus creating sensuality through his own unique forms.
By doing so, his final purpose is to provide his viewers with an upbeat take on life.
Born in Medellin, Colombia, in 1932, Botero began drawing in watercolors at a very young age. In 1952 he traveled
to Europe and studied the classical masters in Madrid and Florence. In 1960 he moved to New York where he
struggled against the dominant art trends and strove for many years to establish his own personal style.
He began making sculpture in 1973 in Paris, creating his particularly distinctive `puffed-up' shapes. Botero's
work is included in numerous public and private collections, such as The Metropolitan Museum of Art, Museum of
Modern Art, and the Solomon R. Guggenheim Museum, New York; The Baltimore Museum of Art; The Hirshorn Museum and
Sculpture Gallery, Washington, D.C.; Israel Museum, Jerusalem; Museo d'Arte Moderna del Vaticano, Italy;
Museo de Arte Contemporaneo, Caracas; Museo de Arte Moderno and the Museo Nacional, Bogota; The Hiroshima City Museum
of Contemporary Art, Saltama, Japan, among many others.
Both playful and statuesque, Man on a Horse, is that and much more.
Botero takes the idea of the monumental equestrian statue most often
used to honor heroes and transforms it into an imposing and whimsical
statement by using the exaggerated rounded forms frequently found
in the folk art. A commanding presence at a major intersection, this
sculpture is rapidly moving into the category of an area landmark. On
long-term loan from the Gateway Foundation.
References:
Location Map
Wikipedia Botero
Botero: Beloved Artist of the Americas
Botero Biography and Exhibitions
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Shoe of Shoes
...by Victoria Fuller, American, b. 1953
Location: In front of the Brown Shoe Company offices
Address: 8300 Maryland Avenue - Clayton, MO 63105
Material: Cast aluminum
Year completed: 1999
Dimensions: 8' H, 12' W, 5' D
Owner: Leased from the artist by the Brown Shoe Company
A giant high-heeled shoe assembled from hundreds of cast aluminum shoes sits in front of the offices of the
famous shoe company.
Not just a giant shoe but a shoe of shoes, as the title implies. Hundreds upon hundreds of silvery high
heel shoes placed every which way finally become sides, sole and heel of a gigantic shoe.
At a distance it is large, imposing, dramatic and seemingly solid, but close up, it’s more a piece of
three-dimensional pop-art lace. Light and air filter through and around the 2,000 shoes that make up
Victoria Fuller’s Shoe of Shoes. The artist suggests that, the relationship of the parts to the whole echoes
the way in which individual cells make up our bodies. Metaphorically speaking, the small shoes
can be seen as the DNA of the larger one. The elegant high heel shoe with the pointy toe also
serves as a cultural icon. Together these shoes suggest a feminine strength. Fuller comments that
the subject of shoes as well as scale and size are a part of story and myth—from Jack in the Beanstalk
to The Old Lady Who Lived in a Shoe to Gulliver’s Travels. This piece was part of the 1999 Pier Walk exhibition
in Chicago. It is fitting that it found a home in front of the Brown Shoe office building in a city that
once was home to 150 shoe companies.
Everyday, common objects are used extensively in Fuller’s work. Sometimes the objects are cast in aluminum and become a construction unit as in Shoe of Shoes. However, Fuller frequently creates assemblages using the actual objects—softballs have become ripening fruit and cell phones symbols of “man’s desire.”
A 1980 graduate of Lorretto Heights College in Denver, Fuller received the Creative Fellowship Award from the Colorado Council on the Arts and Humanities. Since moving to Chicago and completing her MFA at the Art Institute of Chicago, she has received several awards and created numerous outdoor public art pieces.
The artist lives and works in Chicago and created works for Arts in Transit and The People Project in 2002.
References:
St. Louis Pack - Featured Art
St. Louis Regional Arts Commission
Location Map
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Still Point
...by Ruth Keller Schweiss
Location: In front of the Ritz Carlton Hotel
Address: 100 Carondelet Plaza - Clayton, MO 63105
Material: Bronze
Dimensions: 12' H, 20' W, 12' D
Year completed: 1990
The six slender ballerinas, posed in "grand battement," a classical ballet position meaning "great brush off
the floor," were commissioned by the developers of a new luxury hotel for the circular greenspace in the
driveway leading to the grand entry. Three years later, with the development partnership in default and
new owners coming in, the sculpture's safety was at risk in a squabble over the land, which gave the
old owners three sides of the site's property, and the new owners the fourth side, including the access
road and sculpture. The new owners posted a gate at the access point and threatened to bulldoze the road
and sculpture. A judge's restraining order barred harm to the sculpture and fountain until the case was
settled.
The artist, a St. Louis resident, studied at Cranbrook Academy with Carl Milles, sculptor of Meeting of
the Waters. She earned her certificate of fine arts from Washington University.
References:
Location Map
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The Uncertainty of Ground State Fluctuation
...by Alice Aycyock
Location: Center of Clayton
Address: 50 Gay Avenue - Clayton, MO 63105
Material: Aluminum, steel and thermo-formed plastic
Owner: City of Clayton
Donor: Commissioned by the Clayton Art Commission (CAC)
She is an internationally distinguished artist of public sculpture and gallery works. Her work is in major museum collections in the United States and Europe.
This sculpture is located in front of the Center of Clayton at Gay Avenue. The sculpture was commissioned by the
Clayton Art Commission (CAC). It was completed in 2007. The dimensions are 19' H, 20' W, 20' L and the statue is
constructed of structural and spun aluminum, fiberglass, and thermo-formed acrylic. Capturing and activating space,
a large conical form becomes a beacon sitting atop cascading aluminum sheets, ribbons, and a grid — the
calligraphic energy is grounded in a circular space. It also seems to
reach out to spaces beyond. A creator of large-scale semi-architectural
pieces, Aycock developed this commissioned work to reflect both the
surrounding buildings as well as the activities that take place within them.
References:
Location Map
Details
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Uzu Maki #6
...by Gerard Tsutakawa
Location: To be installed at The Crescent
Address: 153 Carondelet Plaza - Clayton, MO 63105
Material: Bronze
Dimensions: 13'L x 9'H x 6'W
Year completed: 2006
Gerard Tsutakawa's exciting installation will be situated in front of The Crescent on Carondelet Avenue.
The artist uses a hand rubbed patina which gives the rich hues of golds, crimsons and bronzes.
The light upon hitting the sculpture explodes with texture and depth, yet remains smooth as silk
on the surface. The piece depicts a vortex. The notion that mankind is a vortex and
can be created by positive energy to the good of all.
References:
Location Map
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Venus Victorius
...by Pierre-Auguste Renoir
Location: Shaw Park Centennial Garden
Address: 231 S. Brentwood Boulevard - Clayton, MO 63105
Material: Bronze
Year completed: 1916
Dimensions: 6' H
Owner: On loan from Saint Louis Art Museum, Bequest of Curt Valentin
installed on June 9, 2009
References:
Location Map
Details
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