Local artist Stillson and his daughter, Cybil, work to create a toothbrush sculpture for the Flower Garden in downtown Nappanee
NAPPANEE — The newly established Nappanee Arts Council has been hard at work with their first major project. The apple sculptures downtown are coming down and, in their place, a larger concept is budding. Sculptors have begun creating large flower-themed pieces to replace the apples downtown.
“We’ve had apples downtown for the last four years and it’s time for them to move elsewhere,” Jeff Stillson, local artist and President of the Nappanee Arts Council, said. “The apple project was a private project of mine four years ago and it took off and it did really well. We’ve always thought about with all the murals downtown, we wanted to continue adding art to downtown, but nothing really ever got done until the mayor asked me to head up the Nappanee Arts Council.”
The Art Path will be a section of the current bicycle and walking path along County Road 7 between Derksen Road and County Road 52, wherein downtown art sculptures will go to retire.
The first section of the Art Path will be placed this spring. The “Apple Orchard” will take all 20-some apples from around Nappanee and place them just off of County Road 7. A concrete pathway will be designed to resemble a trunk and branches, and a rubberized green mulch will take on the image of the greenery of a tree, and throughout the mulch, the apples from downtown will be displayed, creating a giant apple tree layout.
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