New Keeper of the Plains Statue
Posted on May 1, 2017 by Ching under Projects, Things to Do.
A new Keeper of the Plains replica statue was unveiled in our office building a couple of weeks ago. It is one of several 10-foot tall fiberglass replicas of our famous Keeper of the Plains statue that’s part of the “Keepers on Parade” project launched by Together Wichita in 2014.
Brian and I have been anxiously awaiting the unveiling because we collaborated on the design concept last year. When work announced that we would be commissioning our very own Keeper of the Plains replica for the atrium of our Wichita office, they held a design contest.
I wanted to enter the contest but I wanted Brian to help me. Anyway, as the deadline approached, I ended up getting busy with work. On the last day, I found out from Ebony that we only had a few entries. I told Brian what I wanted drawn and he whipped it up real quick. Then he scanned them and emailed them to me for me to send to Ebony. Below is the design that we submitted.
It’s not even colored because we ran out of time. We submitted our design literally moments before the cutoff. Who would have thought that the judges would appreciate the simplicity of our design concept.
That was last year. We’d been waiting for the completed statue since. Here’s a closer look at all the sides of the completed Keeper of the Plains replica statue.
The artist made several changes that improved the overall outcome. They kept the general concept of our design but added and changed some of the elements. I thought all of the design changes worked. The statue turned out even better than I could have ever imagined.
If you are interested in seeing this one in person, it’s located in the atrium of the Ruffin Building on the corner of Douglas and Broadway (100 N. Broadway). There are three others at the pop up park. Those were the first three I had ever seen actually. I have seen several since. They’re scattered all over town.
One of these days I will go and check out all of them. There’s a Keeper Finder map on the Together Wichita web site which makes it a lot easier to locate all of the “Keepers on Parade” statues. If you’re looking for something to do, this would be a fun weekend activity or cheap date idea. It reminds of the time that Brian and I went on a sculpture scavenger hunt on the Wichita State University campus a few years ago. That was a lot of fun.
Perhaps we will see you around at one of these installations. Happy hunting!
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