Sun on your Face .

" It's Spring! "

and artist attribution.

I finally met the artist, when I saw this older gentleman -- who works with his wife doing some of the final detail woodwork, and cleaning away the woodchips as he goes -- late last Spring as he carved the bears into the dead trees in front of the old Barron City Hall, where I was working temporarily for the U.S. Census. Nothing fancy about him at all. When he finally put down his chainsaw, that for a smaller man, he wielded magnificently, I approached and told him how much I admired his work, his "art" peppering the region -- here at Clear Lake park and campgrounds, especially.

He seemed flattered enough, but obviously unused to the compliments, as I was quite sincere. (Contrast to the attitudes of various other artists, that you see all summer at craft sales, asking hundreds for their work, etc.) I overheard a clerk inside asking him what he charged for his work, (she called it work; I called it art), when he went in telling her he was ready to knock off for the day and would be back tomorrow to finish. She had some old stumps, or trees ready to come down, on her property it seems. Depends on the type of tree, what there is to work with, came the answer. Then he quoted a per foot price in the low hundreds, if memory serves correctly -- which often it doesn't, nor do I remember which wood he said worked best. (Oak?) Did the calculations though, and was amazed at how low a price you could get your very long-lasting art sculpture (if you treat it properly) because this man had a talent, was local, and was pricing himself only for his and her own needs, it seems, for their days' labor. (He finishes them in two or three, weather permitting, the wife told me.) So accessible, so beautiful, and looking so different from all angles and distances, in all kinds of weather.

Scroll my blog, and you'll see I've photographed the Clear Lake bears and eagles before. So amazed to meet the man behind it all that day. Wished I'd had my camera to document the process, but then again, I've got it in my head. He's gotten better with time -- more lifelike the bears especially. And of course, he takes what the city wants -- in Barron, three bears -- but looks over what he has to work with and decides ultimately what will work best where. Just a regular looking, middle-aged (60s?) man and his wife, using their tools and getting out of other lumbering to leave something lasting...

I didn't even get his name recorded, but that's his mark if you're ever visiting these parts of Wisconsin. (Gaylord Nelson and Burleigh Grimes hail from Clear Lake, though I see Emerald claims the latter. Ah well, kind of like we could quibble whether Michael Faraday is English or Irish, eh?) Either way, I like him; Gaylord and Burleigh too.