Snow Sculpting in Rockford, Illinois
I’ve always had a fascination for statues, whether they were realistic or of abstract forms. Sculpting animals and people from clay was something I’d had experience with as well as making plaster molds from some items that I wanted to reproduce.
Several years ago, long before we moved out here, I saw that there was an international snow sculpting competition in Rockford, Illinois. One of the rules was that the teams had to have at least three persons involved. I decided to see if I could round up a couple a gals that would fit the bill. Well, to say the least, sculptors were hard to find. One woman had completed a small project which made the newspapers, so I contacted her to see if she was interested. She was. I’ll refer to her as sculptor no. 2. Then I contacted a former student from one of my sculpting classes. She too agreed to go for it.
The next thing we had to do was submit a design to the jurors. I’ve always been intrigued with the legendary white buffalo so we worked up an idea around that. We submitted our design and soon we got word that we were accepted. Meanwhile, I managed to sprain an ankle a few days before we were to go up there, so I was hobbling around, rather than walking normally. I drove the gals to Rockford and we checked in at a designated motel for three nights. Rockford was providing free meals and motels to accommodate all of the sculptors The town scraped snow from the airport runway and placed it in 6’ square x 10’ high wooden molds placed on truck beds and brought them to a park where all the sculptures were to be. When I saw the big square of snow, I realized that I’d not given any thought as to how we were going to get up to the top. It worked out though as a group nearby had a ladder that we were able to borrow. They had sculpted a surfer inside a wave. It looked good for a while, but later collapsed. There was some ice around the sculpture areas, but it wasn’t a problem because town crews were putting down sand for anyone who requested it.
The international groups were in separate area from the locals. They were quite professional. For each of the three days there, we’d eat our breakfasts and head to the park. Our design, which was a buffalo on top of the form, with an Indian crouching below, was working out okay. I sculpted the buffalo and sculptor no. 2 did the Indian. The woman who previously had been one of my students had the least experience, so I had her making texture marks with an ax on the side of the pedestal that the buffalo stood on. This event drew a lot of publicity. Droves of people in their cars slowly passed the exhibits.
There was one day in which the temperatures got into the forties and so the statues were a little bit drippy. A Frenchman came by from an international team and through gestures he and I communicated and discussed the melting snow. To show his disapproval of the snow conditions, he spat. We had a good laugh over it.
The town of Rockford gave each sculptor a bushel basket full of goodies from their stores. And then they had a ceremony to give the winners of the best sculptures their awards. We didn’t win anything, but it was quite an experience. Rockford made us all feel very welcome. It seems like Pagosa could do the same thing.
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