Sign-In
Cart
The Art People Love: Stories of Richard S. Beyer's Life and His Sculpture
Paperback
ArtistsGeneral PhotographySculpture & Installation
Publisher Price: $16.95
ISBN13: 9780874221848
Publisher: Washington St Univ Pr
Published: Nov 24 1999
Pages: 144
Weight: 1.24
Height: 0.35 Width: 10.51 Depth: 9.02
Language: English
We don't know their names. They don't appear to have much money. Where they work, what they believe in, how they vote--it's a mystery. These five anonymous adults, a child, and a dog (with a human face!) comprise a statue group by noted Pacific Northwest artist Richard Beyer called People Waiting for the Interurban.
They're patient, having stood for 20 years at a congested intersection near Seattle's Fremont Bridge--one of the busiest drawbridges anywhere. They've been waiting, oblivious to cars, rumbling trucks, bus fumes, screeching brakes, bleating horns, bicyclists and pedestrians. The full-sized figures stand under a Victorian-style pergola expecting the arrival of Fremont's long-defunct trolley, which will never come. They stand, lost in their own world.
Since its dedication in May 1978, People Waiting for the Interurban has become the best known public sculpture in western Washington. People can't keep their hands off the cast aluminum figures--they're protected from rain with umbrellas, decked out in warm clothes when it snows, dressed up in Santa suits at Christmas time and party hats for New Year's, hold American flags on election day, and exhibit political signs and banners in response to current events. Seattle commuters take the Fremont route in the morning just to see what's with the statues. It's the kind of response that the artist has inspired in other communities, too, after the unveiling scores of works in parks, resorts, playgrounds, commercial buildings, and along city sidewalks.
The sculptures in brick, wood, and metal (particularly aluminum) portray icons and themes from Indian legends and Pacific Northwest history and lifeways. Distinct local creatures such as salmon, coyote, bear, Sasquatch, whales, and activities--storytelling, kissing, playing, watching TV--are a special inspiration to the artist. Persons of all ages interact with them--it's the art people love.
The Art People Love is a perceptive, extensively illustrated overview of the work of the artist written by the person who knows him best--his wife, Margaret Beyer. In addition, The Art People Love serves as a guide to Rich Beyer's sculptures located throughout the Northwest. Besides presenting the artist's goals and views, Margaret Beyer highlights significant, and often controversial, issues in the selection and display of public art in the Pacific Northwest today.
Also in
Artists
Trudeau & Doonesbury: A Biography: The Cartoonist Who Turned the News Into Art
Kendall, Joshua
Hardcover
Glorious Country: How the Artist Frederic Church Brought the World to America and America to the World
Johnson, Victoria
Hardcover
Short Nights of the Shadow Catcher: The Epic Life and Immortal Photographs of Edward Curtis
Egan, Timothy
Paperback
The Worlds of Hayao Miyazaki: The Influences and Inspiration Behind the Iconic Films
Rapold, Nicolas
Hardcover
The Black Family Who Built America: The McKissacks, Two Centuries of Daring Pioneers
McKissack Daniel, Cheryl
Hardcover
Everybody Behaves Badly: The True Story Behind Hemingway's Masterpiece the Sun Also Rises
Blume, Lesley M. M.
Paperback
Becoming Dr. Seuss: Theodor Geisel and the Making of an American Imagination
Jones, Brian Jay
Paperback
Men at Work: The Empire State Building and the Untold Story of the Craftsmen Who Built It
Kurtz, Glenn
Hardcover
The Genius in the Design: Bernini, Borromini, and the Rivalry That Transformed Rome
Morrissey, Jake
Paperback
Modigliani: Man and Myth - Biography and Works of Italian Painter and Sculptor Amedeo Modigliani
Modigliani, Jeanne
Paperback
Everybody Thought We Were Crazy: Dennis Hopper, Brooke Hayward, and 1960s Los Angeles
Rozzo, Mark
Paperback
Impossible: The Love Affair Between Marcel Duchamp and Maria Martins, and the Artwork It Inspired
Naumann, Francis M.
Hardcover
Chapal Rani, the Last Queen of Bengal: The Life and Times of a Female Impersonator
Roy, Sandip
Hardcover
Daniel Burnham and Louis Sullivan: Personal Histories of Two Icons of American Architecture
Thoreson, Trygve
Paperback
Seeing Is Forgetting the Name of the Thing One Sees: Over Thirty Years of Conversations with Robert Irwin
Weschler, Lawrence
Paperback
Autopsy of My Former Self: A journey through grief, transformation, addiction, personal triumph, and purpose
Burse, Jermaine Danté
Paperback
Broken Glass: Mies van der Rohe, Edith Farnsworth, and the Fight Over a Modernist Masterpiece
Beam, Alex
Paperback
The Lonely City: Adventures in the Art of Being Alone (10th Anniversary Deluxe Edition)
Laing, Olivia
Paperback
The Philosophy of Andy Warhol [50th Anniversary Edition]: From A to B and Back Again
Warhol, Andy
Paperback
The Artist and His Museum: Charles Willson Peale and the First Public Museum in the United States
Webber, Diane
Paperback
How to Think Like an Artist: Painters and Sculptors Who Have Changed the Way We See the World
Daunt, Catherine
Hardcover
Art Above Everything: One Woman's Global Exploration of the Joys and Torments of a Creative Life
Griest, Stephanie Elizondo
Paperback
William Blake and the Sea Monsters of Love: Art, Poetry, and the Imagining of a New World
Hoare, Philip
Hardcover
A Clearing in the Distance: Frederick Law Olmsted and America in the 19th Century
Rybczynski, Witold
Paperback
House of Gucci: A Sensational Story of Murder, Madness, Glamour, and Greed
Forden, Sara Gay
Paperback
The Memoirs of Miss Chief Eagle Testickle: Vol. 1: A True and Exact Accounting of the History of Turtle Island
Monkman, Kent
Gordon, Gisele
Paperback
Me, My Guitar, & Nina Simone: Stories of My Musical Life and Adventures with Nina
Schackman, Al
Hardcover
Utterly Lazy and Inattentive: Martin Parr: My Words, My Photographs
Jones, Wendy
Parr, Martin
Hardcover
Passion Is a Fashion: The Real Story of the Clash - Revised and Updated 50th Anniversary Edition
Gilbert, Pat
Paperback
The Black Family Who Built America: The McKissacks, Two Centuries of Daring Pioneers
McKissack Daniel, Cheryl
Paperback
Composing Olana: A Journey on Foot Through Frederic Church's Greatest Work of Art
LaFarge, Annik
Paperback
The Memoirs of Miss Chief Eagle Testickle: Box Set: A True and Exact Accounting of the History of Turtle Island
Monkman, Kent
Gordon, Gisele
Paperback