NOTEBOOK: Story behind ‘Monumental Journey’
SUZANNE BEHNKE Sep 26, 2018 | 8:33 pm
1 min read time
303 wordsBusiness Record Insider, The Insider NotebookRecently, I visited with Tim Hickman, principal at Substance Architecture. While there, I passed by smaller replicas of different projects the firm has worked on, including what I spied to be the recently installed “Monumental Journey.”
It turns out there was a decade-long effort behind it. Hickman has served on the Greater Des Moines Public Art Foundation and gave me the background on the artwork by artist Kerry James Marshall.
Originally, back in 2007, the idea was for the piece to be made of black fiberglass and to be located on the east bank of the Des Moines River. But that plan was delayed when the Army Corps of Engineers changed flood levels; the riverbank site was no longer an option.
“The delay of the project lasted four years while we worked with the city of Des Moines to identify a new site and while we continued to raise funds for the project,” Hickman explained in an email.
Eventually, Hansen Triangle at Grand and Second became the site, and Marshall was contacted to finalize details for the artwork. “At that time Kerry let us know that he had decided to change the material for the sculpture to brick masonry,” Hickman said. One reason: Marshall appreciated that local craftsmen would be involved if brick were used rather than the prefabricated black fiberglass that would have been shipped from California.
Key people behind “Monumental Journey’s” monumental journey including Hickman, who became president of the foundation in January, and foundation Executive Director M. Jessica Rowe. Substance Architecture was the architect on the project, working with the structural engineer, Saul Engineering, and the landscape architect, Genus Landscape Architecture, in implementing Marshall’s vision.
The monument honors the determination of a dozen African-American lawyers who created an independent bar association after being denied membership in the American Bar Association.