A 15-foot tall roadrunner hitched a ride on a flatbed truck from Santa Fe, N.M. on the night of Sunday, Nov. 24, and was installed atop its three-foot base on the morning of Tuesday, Nov. 26 in the roundabout of the Morgan and Arrow Road along State Route 179 as part of the city of Sedona’s Art in the Roundabouts project. 

Three more SR 179 installations are expected to follow in the near future. “The Sedona Roadrunner” is the work of husband-and-wife team Don Kennell and Lisa Adler, who run DKLA Design. 

“There’s a very famous expression: ‘Ars longa, vita brevis’: ‘Art is long, life is short,’” Kennell said to those in attendance. “It’s wonderful to think of that in terms of artwork, but in terms of the process of realizing public art, I began to say that phrase to myself a bit in the last few years … We are honored to be here in Sedona, to have this piece here. What we’ve done is half of the equation. This community is the other half.” 

The Art in the Roundabouts program was budgeted at $232,000 in fiscal year 2024, with $167,000 in funding from the city of Sedona and a $65,000 donation from Gary and Diane Carson. 

“The beautiful part of the Art in the Roundabouts program is that we have a public art ordinance,” Arts and Culture Specialist Nancy Lattanzi said. “In the ’90s, we had an Arts in Public Places ordinance that went into effect, and basically what it states is that any building that goes up, or a building is expanded structurally … you have to pay a certain percentage to the Arts in Public Places fund. That’s how we get our money to support our local arts.”

“The Sedona Roadrunner” is made from Cor-Ten steel, carbon steel and galvanized sheet metal shaped into shingle-like feathers that are welded to a structural steel armature. 

“We used these materials because they are kind of earthy and natural, no maintenance,” Kennell said. “That’s another thing about Sedona, I feel like you’re surrounded by earth and these beautiful plants, and they’re so prominent. So we felt the materials were a good match. The galvanized steel is very reactive to the atmosphere and sky … The light here seems important. It seems to take on different aspects at different times of day, and it was important for our materials to do that.”

“We take these hard materials, they come to us in flat sheets, and we apply a lot of energy, a lot of heart and a lot of love to mold them into these living, breathing creatures … and turn them into creatures that seem like they could run off,” Adler said.

Kennell and Adler typically create large-scale sculptures of wildlife “to take the audience out of their daily lives and invite the viewer to connect with nature via art,” according to their artist statement. Their previous projects have included a 35-foot-tall polar bear made from salvaged car hoods that debuted at the 2018 Burning Man Festival before going on a national tour.

“The scale of our sculptures makes humans seem small, but the sculpture in the setting of Sedona, it’s like the scale is right on,” Adler said. “It’s always such a relief to see a project to completion, but seeing it today in this environment is the real kicker for us.” 

“This is something to celebrate, and the people going around in the cars, honking, screaming, giving it a thumbs-up, just shows how special public art is to community spaces,” Lattanzi said. “It brings us together, and it’s an amazing work of art.” 

As if on cue, a passing motorist honked in approval. 

The next installation in the Art in the Roundabouts program was Susan Kliewer’s “Julian and Maria,” which was unveiled in the Canyon Drive roundabout on Tuesday, Dec. 3, after press time. Maria Martinez [1887-1980] and her husband Julian Pocano Martinez [1879-1943] were Tewa artists of the San Ildefonso Pueblo in New Mexico who popularized Pueblo-style pottery art. James Muir’s “Eternal,” a allegorical sculpture of a Mobius ring with a lamp in the center, which lights the pathway for the traveler, will be installed at Chapel Road, and Mark Feldtkeller’s “Look In Up,” which incorporates obelisks and American Indian symbols, will be installed at the Back O’ Beyond roundabout at dates to be determined.