Back on track

I've had a crazy and very productive summer. Because of the delays last Spring, I had to back-burner this project. Now that all the others are completed, I'm really looking forward to starting on these sculptures. I'm starting with molds of little cars. I also have stashes of pottery from the turn of the last century, recovered from the earth in downtown on some street excavation project.

Back on track

After an unavoidable delay, I'm back on track on this project. I'm looking forward to reading John & Jessie Fremont's "Memoirs." I walk half marathons, and I can't imagine walking back and forth between Sac and St. Louis, especially as many times as he did.

New location for vessels

The Friends of Fremont, Don, the architect and I met at the Park to consider options that might better meet the needs of the space, now that more neighbors are getting involved. They expressed the desire to have a small, raised platform for performances or events. Don had suggested the planter area on the East and this turned out to be an excellent choice. Ideally, funds can be found to create the platform by time the time I'm ready to install.

The platform will hopefully have a compass rose design in colored cement, though the vessels might be installed at ground level, surrounded by new planting.

Late afternoon in the Park

Two members of Friends of Fremont Park Association joined Don, the architect, and I for a late afternoon meeting. We're rethinking placement of the sculptures to respond to the nature of the Park as it is now, not a year and one-half ago. I'm really happy about this. I think the Park deserves to be used by, how shall I say this... upstanding citizens. They have been reclaiming the territory, both during the day and at night. We all hope that enough money can be found to add a substantial amount of lighting so that the space can be used on lovely, warm, Sacramento summer evenings.

5:15pm

Notes on Fremont's Autobiography_1

     Remarkably, I was able to purchase an exact reproduction of Fremont's autobiography, Memoirs of My Life By John Charles Fremont: Including In The Narrative Five Journeys Of Western Expansion During The Years 1842-1854 V1. The title page inside explains further: "A retrospect of fifty years, covering the most eventful periods of modern American History." The original manuscript was written in 1886, and this exact copy is published by Kessinger Publishing's Rare Reprints ,  which has an amazing array of impressive & enticing options.
My goal here is not to provide a Cliff's Notes on Fremont and his contributions to California history, but as a lay historian and artist, to selectively pluck those events or issues that Fremont relates in his own words as they resonate with me, and how those words influence this sculpture. Perhaps you will be inspired to study Fremont more deeply than I, and have opinions that differ. If so, I encourage you to make comments.

     At this point, in the beginning of my journey with Fremont, my intention is to both learn about the man and his influences, not only in his own time, but in ours. What did he do then that has informed and defined what we, who now live in this Valley, experience today?

In Fremont's introduction, "The Scope of the Work," he gives three reasons for writing the book:
1   " the geographical explorations, made in the interest of Western expansion,"
2   " the presidential campaign of 1856, made in the interest of and undivided country," and
3   "the civil war, made in the same interest,"
with an emphasis on his role in acquiring California for the United States. For the sculpture, I'm most interested in the first reason.
Further, he says that "the region between the Mississippi and the Pacific Ocean presents a different face from that to which these accounts relate."  I've driven this land and I've flown over it on a clear day. I'm not sure it's changed much at all since his traverses, except for the status of Native Americans, of course.  

to be continued...

Update

The engineering plans were submitted and approved by the City Building Dept. on Jan. 29th.

Several days later, CADA , a major player in Sacramento, held a community meeting with many agenda items, including Fremont Park. Let me repeat (see below) that this blog is an excellent forum to voice your comments.

The concept of the sculpture as vessel.

I've chosen the vessel shape for a couple of reasons. First, a more voluminous, less static shape offers more surface area, and second, the vessel is a metaphor for Sacramento as a container of the great diversity of peoples and cultures contained within.

John Fremont: Visionary Pathfinder

John C. Fremont was to California and  Western expansion what Lewis and Clark were to Oregon. With his guide and trusted friend, Kit Carson, he led multiple expeditions for Congress, created routes for emigration that was soon to follow. Between 1842 and 1846, he lead four expeditions back and forth between St. Louis and what would later be known as California. I ordered a reprint of his memoirs.

Because I'm a very curious person, and tend to become obsessed with my subjects, I'll be doing some extra research about this very remarkable man. I'm most interested in his first four expeditions and his impact on this region.