The Madison Arts Commission unanimously agreed Tuesday on designs for a nearly one-story-tall sugar maple leaf sculpture, which could replace the clock tower on the 800 block of State Street, adjacent to Library Mall, when the area is reconstructed next year.
Artist Jill Sebastian, a sculpture professor at the Milwaukee Institute of Art & Design, presented designs for an approximately 13-foot-tall maple leaf sculpture, constructed from brushed stainless steel, which Sebastian said fits into the design team’s plan to transform Library Mall into a “timeless, flexible and durable” destination.
Sebastian said she was inspired by the “portal” aspect of Library Mall, how it transforms students as they pass through either on their way to the library or the union, and more broadly how it changes them as they move through their academic time at the University of Wisconsin-Madison. Sebastian said she also drew from her personal experience.
“When I was a student in 1968, the Martin Luther King candlelight march is something that changed me forever,” Sebastian said. “That when I think of this space for me it’s a place where I became a citizen, not just a woman, but actually a citizen.”
Sebastian said the leaf of a sugar maple, the official state tree, encapsulates the intersection of three ideas that represent the transformation students go through during their time in Madison: a leaf, a bird when the sculpture’s shadow disperses as the sun goes down and the waves of Lake Mendota, created when the light shines through the structure.
“It’s a challenge for an artist to take something that’s known ... and to make you see it differently,” Sebastian said.
The city will vote on the art installation when it considers the whole proposal for the 700 and 800 blocks of State Street, which city engineer Chris Petykowski said could be as early as January.
