Lucy's Gone Away

On this chill of a day, a blustery afternoon after the first dusting of snow of the year, it might be appropriate to pause and remember part of Winston's public art past. In the mid 1970s neighbors in the revitalizing West End part of town contracted with an artist to gift to the city a work that seemed to symbolize the emerging yet unfinished rebirth of their own historic neighborhood. The artist, a young Thomas Sayre, placed the work in the woods-encircled natural amphitheater that is northeast Hanes Park. In a moment of unintended prophetic irony, the artist called the walled edifice "Lucy's Gone Away." Though not everyone appreciated the symbolism of the work, no one thought its presence in the landscape was in jeopardy. But, not many months after this picture was taken, a landscaping crew damaged part of the work while mowing. When someone asked what to do about it, no one in the city quite knew how to "fix it;" and, not long after that, one day the work was simply torn down. Lucy went away.

Public art is a mix of things large and small, temporary and permanent. But it almost always is intentional in its appearance in the landscape. The lesson of Lucy is, if a community is not intentional in preserving and maintaining public art in the landscape, it will disappear. Let's hope we've learned our lesson in Winston. Photo courtesy of Thorns Craven.