They were mixing two tons of concrete by the Quinnipiac River near midnight and there wasn’t even a dead body in sight. Only art.
David Zakur and friends were getting a heads-up on Citywide Open Studios by mixing and pouring the base for a 10-by-10-foot plate metal relief sculpture that will be installed Thursday to celebrate Fair Haven’s oystering past and riverine future.
The sculpture is a kind of abstracted representation of a double-masted sharpie, a unique oyster boat that was fashioned on the Quinnipiac River in the heyday of the shellfish industry in the 19th century. It was created and fabricated by Val Kropiwnicki, an artist who for many years rented a studio at 185 Front St.
The studio is 20 feet from where, under cover of night, Zakur and a half-dozen stalwart Fair Haveners, including arborist Chris Ozyck and theater audio engineer David Baker, were mixing, pouring, and smoothing their slurry by the flickering lights of the Grand Avenue Bridge; occasionally a mysterious boat, most definitely not a phantom sharpie, came loudly motoring by.
“Drug dealer,” murmured Ozyck.
Zakur, who’s a busy research scientist with Cara Therapeutics in Shelton, but lives nearby on Front Street, could simply find no other time in his schedule for the concrete mixing than nearing the midnight hour Sunday.
Zakur, who was the conceiver of the design and the fundraiser for the sculpture, planned to paint it bright red so that. “ During all seasons of the year, it will pop out and call attention to the river behind it.” (Pictured is the sculpture, after its red coat was applied, later in the week.)
With an image of the bridge and ribbons of the river in the sculpture, the quarter-inch plate metal design is a “negative relief,” the idea being that when you look at the depiction of the river or the bridge, you are also looking through it at the river itself.
Perhaps the most interesting feature of a base involving 34 80-pound bags of concrete and a hundred gallons of water is that the siting of the sculpture will not be permanent. Zakur was inspired to place his permanent/impermanent handprint in the still wet handiwork.
The sculpture, which weighs about 500 pounds, is being installed in an open area on the waterfront between 185 and 195 Front St. The temporary waterfront home is being provided on the property of what will become an open plaza in Oyster Harbor Village, an interlinked condominium and mixed use development that Fereshteh Bekhrad is creating to link both sides of the river north of Grand.
When Zakur heard that Bekhrad (pictured) was offering this open space to Citywide Open Studios, in addition to giving the adjoining warehouse spaces for artists to show their works, he asked her and she consented to let the sculpture make its debut there.
“It’s really perfect,” said Zakur, “because the origin of the work was in the idea to have Val’s work be the first in a string or charm bracelet of public art works linking the parks of Fair Haven, from Dover down to Criscuolo.”
It was first to be located on Chatham and Front Streets, but after receiving the kudos and imprimatur and even grants from the city and others sources (including the Greater New Haven Community Foundation and private “polar plunge” income generated through the Elm City Parks Conservancy), the city has balked on giving permission for siting in the public way. “It’s simply because they are still in the process of working out insurance issues and its whole policy on public art,” said Zakur, as he tipped another 200 pounds of concrete into the four-by-ten foot hole, with reinforcing re-bar rods, that Ozyck had prepared.
“When they do, we’ll be able to move the piece to an appropriate public location and it’ll be one of many of what I call artistic nodes, to complement the green spaces, that beautify the waterside walks in Fair Haven.
“Look, people used to expect to see nothing but blighted buildings in Fair Haven,” Zakur continued. “Now they see green spaces and brightly colored flowers. The idea of art growing out of this, as a next step, seemed just right.”
Only planting a public sculpture permanently turns out to be a little more complicated than planting a tree, but Zakur has faith. The city has an inventory of more than 200 public art works, he said, from the Amistad memorial to the work of artists who, in more lenient eras, spontaneously, and without permissions, gave the city their public art, without thinking about the paperwork. Now the city is thinking, and taking a bit of time.
Meanwhile, Ozyck said that the sculpture is conceived in such a way as it could be divided into three modular parts and each part could be placed on even another private property owner’s site, if necessary.
“The point of what David has initiated,” said Ozyck, “is to use art to call attention to the water that unifies this area and gives it its character. All private development along the river now is required to have access to the water, and this art can point to and underline that.”
Bekhrad said that the open space, where the Kropiwinicki sculpture will rise, on Thursday, at the inauguration of Citywide Open Studios, there will also be a festive white tent, musicians, and boat rides she’s providing to link the two banks of the river.
After another late night, the sculpture is in its temporary residence along the Quinnipiac River! Many thanks to all who made this a possibility. We hope to permanently dedicate this public piece as soon as logistics are worked out with regards to its permanent home. To clarify a little, my group approached artist Val Kropiwnicki with the subject of a Fair Haven Sharpie. It was the artist who conceptualized that subject into a model, and then the finished sculpture. The artist felt that red was an appropriate color as it stands out in all seasons. He was obviously correct! Come down to Front Street during CWOS to enjoy this and other artists endeavors along our historic waterfront!