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Shape of The Lakeby Vicki Molloy
The inspiration While I was volunteering during the quiet covid times I used to watch out the big front windows of the visitor centre. I noticed that people walking by never seemed to notice in the building. This got me thinking about how we could be more visible and entice people to come inside. It occurred to me that many art galleries have a sculpture out front. We had a foundation structure to work with and electricity near by. I decided it had to be something I cared about and that highlighted some aspect of Peachland. Lightbulb moment, the Salmon! The Deep Creek salmon run, and Hardy falls certainly deserved to be highlighted and celebrated! Proving the Concept! I made a model of what I thought could be done with the somewhat tricky structure and presented it to the board. Making a model assured me that I could do a good job, it would just be on a larger scale. I presented the model and concept to the PCAC board, they liked it and gave the go ahead. I also had many ideas for companion activities that would continue the theme inside the visitor centre. Bring the Vision to Fruition!
What panned out was the attention-grabbing 11 ft tall sculpture, made up of 81 pieces cut from ¼” plywood. The water and fish were cut using a CNC machine and the boulders were cut by power saw. Each piece had to be hand painted on both sides. Thankfully, fellow board member and artist Terry Moore offered to paint the fish pieces. His skill and efforts really made the concept come alive. What a welcome contribution it was! With the fish underway at Terry's studio. I set up an 8x4' table in my workshop and got busy painting the other pieces. It was quite the production line! The last step was a protective clear coat and my faithful assistant, husband Mike, set up a spray booth in the driveway. There was water and fish everywhere! Soon all was dry and packed up ready for the installation. I called on Trevor Neyedli to help install. We needed a tall guy! The actual support structure was somewhat different to the model, we had to adjust as we went along. It came together nicely, albeit taking longer than expected. A great big “Thank you” to Mike and Trevor! To build on the theme of the sculpture inside to the visitor centre we source souvenir keychains (a salmon of course, did you get one?) combined with a free raffle for one of the painted salmon from the sculpture. The Reveal On August 4, 2023 the finished sculpture was revealed. Around 50 people attended the reveal including the Mayor. The ceremony included speeches by Lee Humphries from Peachland Watershed Protection Alliance and myself. Paula McLaughlin, played the guitar and had the audience playing instruments and singing along to “The Salmon Cycle Song”. I read the poem “Water By Salmon”. My motivation for the sculpture was 'people can't care about what they don't know about', I hoped to increase awareness of the importance of water and how salmon are a bellwether for the health of our lake. Leading to the name of the sculpture. "Shape of the Lake" Where are the Fish Now? We marked everything carefully during the take down to aid in putting it back in place. Look for the sculpture to make a reappearance August 2024. |