[Peace-discuss] Does Urbana courthouse plaza need giant Lincoln head? NO!

[Brian Dolinar]

How ironic - a huge Disney-like image of Lincoln, the man who "freed the
slaves,"
in front of the courthouse - the modern institution to re-enslave a
generation of poor black folks.

BD

[image: The News-Gazette.com] Does Urbana courthouse plaza need giant
Lincoln head? By Paul
Wood<http://www.news-gazette.com/news/reporter/pwood/> Saturday
August 23, 2008

Artist Frank Gallo used Photoshop to illustrate his concept for an Abraham
Lincoln sculpture outside the Champaign County Courthouse in Urbana.

URBANA – One super-big Lincoln head could be in Urbana's future.

Champaign County Board member Ralph Langenheim, an Urbana Democrat, is
promoting a proposed Frank Gallo sculpture for the plaza in front of the
Champaign County Courthouse.

Twenty-one feet tall, it would resemble one of the mysterious Easter Island
sculptures, only with a stovepipe hat. Rubbing his nose might be a stretch.

Langenheim notes that of all the artists who have passed through
Champaign-Urbana or the University of Illinois, only Gallo and Lorado Taft
have international reputations.

He acknowledges that when he shows a picture that Gallo has Photoshopped
from a Lincoln head he donated to Urbana High School, the usual reaction is
shock.

"Every county courthouse in Illinois has a statue in the stylized Lincoln
cliche style," Langenheim said. "This would not be one of those. It would
attract some pretty strong feelings."

The county board member said people should think in terms of the famed
Chicago Picasso sculpture, which was reviled upon its unveiling but now
serves a symbol of how Chicago thinks differently.

"This is capable of becoming an iconic thing that would make this community
known," Langenheim said.

"I think it would draw attention to Urbana in a way I would rather not draw
attention to Urbana," countered Steve Beckett, a fellow Urbana Democrat on
the county board.

Beckett, former judge Harold Jensen and UI Professor Bruce Hannon have been
leaders in restoring and adding to the courthouse, which is on the same spot
as an earlier courthouse where Lincoln practiced law.

Beckett has seen the photo and doesn't think it will fly.

"Public art is one of most difficult issues communities face," he said. "Art
is so subjective. What we've been thinking about is how and why Lincoln was
in Urbana, as a politician, as a lawyer, as a friend, and this doesn't seem
to do it."

Gallo is delighted by strong reactions like Beckett's.

"I want to engage the people who live here, guys like Steve Beckett, and
make them confront how they feel about Lincoln, maybe give me some input,"
the sculptor said.

The head looks enormous in the photo that Gallo produced; it's meant to.

"I wanted to capture the Mount Rushmore feeling: generous, large,
significant," he said.

"With the addition of the stovepipe hat, it's even more so."

The sculpture wouldn't look too much like the photo, he said. The face will
be younger and beardless, to reflect Lincoln's time here, and the hat would
be different. There would be some sort of platform.

Gallo also likes a certain cartoonish aspect he finds in certain Matthew
Brady photographs of the Great Emancipator.

Lincoln had a number of different looks, he said, "not just the one you see
at every county courthouse."

He thinks the courthouse is the perfect setting.

"Every time I drive by and look at this empty plaza, I see this giant head.

"And let's put a hat on him," Gallo said.
-- 
Brian Dolinar, Ph.D.
303 W. Locust St.
Urbana, IL 61801
briandolinar at gmail.com
-------------- next part --------------
An HTML attachment was scrubbed...
URL: http://lists.chambana.net/mailman/archive/peace-discuss/attachments/20080823/e6e23941/attachment.htm