Board to Interview 5 Finalists for Public Art in Park at Police Cove

The five finalists for the creation of a piece of “public art” at Police Cove park in Barrington will be interviewed on Monday evening, July 22, with one of the sculptor expected to be given the $30,000 contract for the artwork that night.

Two of the finalists will be interviewed in person; three will be interviewed on the Skype online network. Each of the finalists has already submitted a detailed proposal for the artwork in the park.

The public meeting will be held in the School Committee Room in Town Hall. It starts at 7 pm.

The five finalists have been culled from an original 95 proposals by the Police Cove Park Committee, said Town Planner Phil Hervey. Committee members used a scoring system online over about three weeks to grade the original proposals.

That group was then cut to 15 at a public meeting in Town Hall “based on the scores and the proposals that seemed to be a good fit for the park,” he said. 

The five finalists come from all across the country, including Arizona, Michigan, Kentucky, Brooklyn, NY, and Cranston. The two latter finalists will be the artists interviewed in person, Hervey said.

Each of the finalists has submitted a concept proposal and a rendering of the work they would like to build in the park. You can see photos of their artworks above.

The proposals came from:

• Douwe Blumberg of Douwe Studios in LaGrange, Kentucky
• Stephen Fairfield, the lead artist at Fairfield Enterprises in St. David, Arizona.
• Wendy Klemperer of Brooklyn, NY
• Robert Barnum of R. L. Barnum Studios in Mecosta, Michigan
• Deter Wright of Cranston