A Giant Tale
STEAMBOAT SPRINGS, CO – When the Steamboat Springs School District got the green light from public voters in November 2019 to build its first school in 40 years, district officials wanted the design to impart a legacy. A commissioned art collection shares the story of the area on the west side of Steamboat Springs, where the Sleeping Giant School for pre-kindergarten through eighth grade opened its doors to students on Tuesday, Aug. 24.
In agreement with the Sleeping Giant Art Committee, the district enlisted Denver-based NINE dot ARTS® to curate the artwork sourced through regional and local artists. The goal was to honor the area’s rich history through depictions of the indigenous Utes, along with the site’s wildlife and natural beauty.
Joe Norman, a Loveland-based sculptor, was drawn to the symmetry of the local sandhill crane population and nearby nesting sites for his three-piece installation. “I drew a parallel with the migratory pattern of birds and my own school-age daughter for inspiration,” he says. “The birds are gone in the winter but back for the summer, which is the opposite for students.”
A trio of three-foot sandhill cranes morph into the figure of a child as you move around each piece at the front of the school. To withstand the weather, Norman used stainless steel, which he painted on one side. The other side was left as brushed raw steel with clear coat varnish to give a reflective quality. “Humans have a complicated relationship with reflective surfaces. There is something emotional about seeing a picture of yourself in something,” he says. Norman said the metaphor of migration is a useful tool to understand the process of education as students come and go throughout the seasons and eventually leave the school for other adventures.
Inside the building, on a wall beneath a learning space encased in a treehouse, hang three standalone pieces by Windsor-based artist Ashley Stiles. Her mixed media work, “Original Influencers,” represents the past, present and future of the indigenous Utes through their contributions to art, medicine and nature. “Many of my friends are Ute. This is their story and I wanted to make sure I was accurate,” says Stiles, a member of the Chickasaw tribe. The middle piece shows a young boy engaged in a traditional bear dance. Bear was chosen as the school mascot. Three human silhouettes cut from mirrored material reflect the diverse roles of the modern Ute in society. “I hope people will see the pieces and want to learn more about the indigenous people,” she says.
Three Steamboat based artists collaborated on the final installation, a 46-foot-long mural titled “The Sleeping Giant’s Past.” Jill Bergman, Jennifer Baker and Sandi Poltorak, partners at Pine Moon Fine Art, combined their talents to create a design that was initially sketched by Bergman, a printmaker and mural artist.
Bergman painted the foundation of the piece onto poltab. It includes the Sleeping Giant, native aspens and local wildlife along with a herd of bison in a nod to the indigenous communities of Colorado. Baker, a glass artist, created impressionist style wildflowers and bluebirds, which were epoxied onto the polytab to give a three-dimensional appearance while enabling Bergman’s paint to show through. Sandi Poltorak added four framed charcoal and colored pencil drawings of moose, an eagle, two sandhill cranes and tipis in another nod to the Ute.
“We have three very distinct mediums, but I think they blended very well,” Baker says. The trio had two practice shots at laying out the final piece before Bergman and her husband, Matt Irvin, had the unenviable task of hanging the polytab. “There were definitely sleepless nights, but we did a lot of research, took some artistic license and supported each other through the process to bring it all together,” Bergman says.