The nonprofit Big Park Regional Coordinating Council’s Art in the Roundabouts Committee unveiled its final selections for art pieces to be installed in the Village of Oak Creek’s roundabouts at the Sedona Public Library in the Village on May 1. The finalists were “Golfer” by Shirley Wagner and Jason Butler, “Man in the Maze” by James Muir, “Village Treasures” by Reagan Word and “Dream Catcher” and “Autumn Challenge” by Chris Navarro.

The committee formed in May 2022 and made its selections during the spring, taking public comment throughout May on its website. On Thursday, June 20, one or two of the works will be forwarded to Yavapai County and the Arizona Department of Transportation for installation approval.     

“We will be looking for preliminary approval from ADOT on those designs and see if they like them,” Art in the Roundabouts Chairman Steve Fiedler said. “If they don’t, they’ll probably tell us what we have to change.”

Fiedler said he does not have an estimate for when ADOT will get back to them.

“ADOT has to approve it,” Fiedler said. “Then we have to collect donations. And so I’m sure the artists want to make sure that donation money is available before they pursue having the piece made. It takes about a year for a piece to be made and installed. And so we’re looking at probably end of 2025.”

The roundabouts expected to receive art will be those at Ridge Trail and Los Posadas, Jacks Canyon Road and Verde Valley School Road, Cortez Road and Bell Rock Boulevard. 

“We don’t have any … art in the village except for the bronze horse in front of the Village Gallery, and so I think some artwork would be nice,” Fiedler said. “There’s not many places in the village to have artwork. There’s only the VOC Park, and so roundabout is basically it … So community support for artwork is going to have to be on roundabouts. So that’s why it’s important for us doing that. And at the same time these roundabouts had an eight-foot pad installed originally 13 years ago for artwork. And so we want to finish out the project, put the artwork up.”

Shirley Wagner and Jason Butler

“I like to say ‘I bring metal to life by using a series of metal cubes that articulate in space,’” Wagner said. “They convey the gesture of the human form. And when you convey gesture, or movement, you elicit an emotional response from your viewer.”

The two-person sculptor team based in Tucson have proposed “Golfer,” a 15-foot-high hand-fabricated steel sculpture of a female golfer that uses geometric forms to depict the subject and movement. 

“We started working together five years ago,” Butler said. “[Wagner] comes up with these figures, I build them for her, and mentor her along the way … She’s a mature woman, but she’s new to sculpture and metal and public art and large scale and things like that.”

The cost for “Golfer” is estimated at $33,000 for a bright blue version or $27,750 for a natural rust finish. The bright blue would contrast with the red rocks, but Butler conceded that it may be too vibrant for some people’s taste. 

“So if more of a toned-down finish is desired than we thought, kind of a red rusted steel would jive well with the color of the rocks,” Butler said. “That’s a little less maintenance, it’ll just kind of rust and develop that patina over the years. Something that’s powder-coated is going to look great for five to 10 years and then it’s going to start to lose some of its vibrant blue color and fade out a bit. Either [way], maintenance-wise, it’s pressure washing once a year.”

James Muir

“The ‘Man-in-the-Maze’ is a sculptural representation of the ancient enigmatic symbol of the same name recognized in at least five Native American cultures of the Southwest,” Muir wrote in a presentation set up at the open house. “Especially as relating to the Hopi descendants of an amalgamation of the Anasazi and Sinauga peoples who populated this area known as ‘Palatkwapi — Place of the Red Rocks’ for centuries before the coming of the first Anglo settlers and whose trade route the ‘Palatkwapi Trail,’ connecting the Hopi mesas to the salt mines and the copper/mineral mines of present-day Camp Verde and Jerome, passed just south of ‘Big Park,’ Village of Oak Creek.”

Muir said he envisioned his bronze figure of an American Indian looking down at a maze that symbolizes a person’s journey through life as a greeting to the modern-day traveler entering the red rocks. The cost estimate for the bronze figure is $42,000 with potentially another $6,000 in landscaping costs. 

Reagan Word

“The village views were my first peek into the wonders of red rock country,” Word wrote in his artist statement for his proposal “Village Treasures.” “A sculpture marking this entry point seems most appropriate, highlighting the red rocks, our junipers, cacti and hummingbirds, some of our priceless village treasures.”

Word first visited the VOC in 1987 and his works have been showcased throughout Sedona since his relocation to the area in 1988. Design, construction and installation of the 13-foot-high sculpture is estimated to cost approximately $83,500. 

“I didn’t know what to expect and the minute I saw those red rocks, I had my head out the window, I couldn’t believe it,” Word said. “My father-in-law was driving [the] car and I had my camera out the window taking pictures of Courthouse.”

Chris Navarro

Navarro’s two works are “Autumn Challenge,” a nine-foot-tall bronze of a bull elk bugling standing nine feet tall, and “Dream Catcher,” a bronze and steel sculpture depicting a raven perched atop a dreamcatcher. “The life-size raven is cast in bronze. The dreamcatcher would be made of steel and the four-by-six pedestal created of masonry and local flagstone rock,” Navarro explained in a statement.

“Bronze is a very tough, durable medium, that sculpture will be there for centuries,” Navarro said. “ I’ve been [involved] professionally for over 38 years, and it’s really satisfying to know that long after I’m gone, a lot of people will still be viewing my art work. And I believe they say 3 million cars a year drive into Sedona … All artists want to have their work viewed and to think it’d be in such a prominent location makes me feel good about it.”

The cost estimate for “Autumn Challenge” is $110,000, which Navarro has agreed to mark down by $35,000 as a donation, while “Dream Catcher” is estimated at $50,000, with a sponsor who will donate $5,000. 

“I was driving through Page and they have this large dreamcatcher at one of those Navajo shops, it’s like a 12-foot diameter dreamcatcher,” Navarro said.  “I was driving by and I saw a raven sitting on top of it, I thought that would make a great sculpture … Spiritually it’s a messenger bird and the ravens are very intelligent. And the dreamcatcher is a native spirituality. So I thought it could kind of add to the Sedona.”

For more information about the Arts in the Roundabouts Committee, visit OurVillageArt.org.