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(‘St. Armands Statues - Continued) |
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Simultaneously, the City of Sarasota public works department was designing neckouts along St. Armands Circle, to provide pedestrians with a safe area to rest before stepping into a crosswalk. One proposed landscape plan called for placing seven concrete pads on one of the neckouts. The pads could hold flower pots or something else. Pinto asked if statues could be placed on the pads. The City said yes, and Pinto immediately went to work contacting stone workshops in Florida and China. “When I got the pricing for China, I realized we could purchase four or five times as many statues with the same amount of expenditure,” said Pinto. After visiting the shop in Beijing, he ordered 21 statues and made the necessary arrangements to have them imported to the United States, driven from Savannah, GA to Sarasota then installed on St. Armands. The centerpiece attraction is a series of seven statues entitled the Allegory of Sarasota: Its Seven Virtues. All seven statues are placed on concrete pads on the neckout at John Ringling Blvd. — the very place where the City’s original design provided place holders for something to accentuate the area. “It’s all to their credit how they’ve been able to put that together,” said Deputy Public Works Director Todd Kucharski. “And, the residents worked with the City so that we could enhance the area rather than just placing plant material there, bringing some sculptures into place,” said Kucharski. Just head to St. Armands and you will see residents and visitors alike strolling the circle and admiring the new artwork. “For the businesses on St. Armands it’s exciting for them to see this energy, this newness to see things fresh and alive and there’s an infusion of energy back into the circle, which is exciting for everybody,” said Diana Corrigan, Pres., St. Armands Circle Association. A brochure will soon be available at businesses along St. Armands Circle providing details and descriptions of all the statues. For more information on Save Our Statues including how you can adopt a statue, call Ed Pinto 240-423-2848 or visit st.armands.org To watch a video segment about the statues on “Commissioner’s Corner”, on Access Sarasota, featuring Commissioner Richard Clapp, click here. |
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Three of the Seven Virtues. From left: Asclepius; Flora; Music |
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Wouldn’t it be nice, someone suggested, to return St. Armands to the John Ringling era in the 1920’s, when Ringling envisioned St. Armands as a thriving economic center accentuated with an abundance of public artwork for all to enjoy? The St. Armands Residents Association formed the “Save Our Statues” committee with the intent of cleaning and restoring the existing Ringling era statues and purchasing a few new statues. Residents embraced the concept wholeheartedly at an annual dinner last February. “We raised $30,000 in about 15-20 minutes,” said Ed Pinto, Save Our Statues chairman. “We ultimately ended up raising about $150,000 in private donations, from individuals, businesses, the City, the County, the Community Foundation etc. So, we’ve had support from all quarters.” The City of Sarasota contributed $25,000. |
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The marble statues were handcrafted in Beijing, China. |
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