The 24th Florida Outdoor Sculpture Competition is on display on the Lemon Street Promenade and Lakeland Public Library through the end of 2024. In the fall of 2023, artists submitted applications through an online application process for consideration in the 2024 show. A jury comprised City staff, Polk Museum of Art representatives, and members from the local arts community gathered to review the submissions. Artists submitted over 60 sculptures for review, with the jury picking 11 of the best to display.
For the third year, the footprint of the exhibit space has expanded to include one sculpture at the Lakeland Public Library on Lake Morton. The remaining ten sculptures cover three blocks of Lemon Street between South Florida and Massachusetts Avenue. The artwork along the Lemon Street Promenade and Library provides a great aesthetic that can be enjoyed on a weekend stroll or as a diversion while visiting the swans on Lake Morton. This year, visitors can look forward to an entertaining display including everything from a pixel represented tree (Urban Forest), TWO horses (The Wild One and Show Horses), and a 12-foot tall gentleman with his dog (Live LARGE) on the corner of South Florida Ave.
Pam Page, Deputy Director of Parks, Recreation, and Cultural Arts, said, “The sculptures on Lemon Street were introduced to provide free access to public art for all who live and visit our community. We are fortunate to live in a City that recognizes the value of public art that introduces culture and well-being.”
Previous years:
2017, 2018, 2019, 2020, 2021, 2022, 2023
Thanks to all who voted, and congrats to this year's winner:
Live LARGE from local Lakeland sculptor Keith Williams.
Voting ended 6/13/24 at 4 PM EDT.
Eve
Medium: Steel, epoxy, patina, lacquer, wax
Artist's Description
Eve is representational of women of all ages and origins
Artist's Statement
The creation of sculpture is my desire to see what is in my heart and mind and then communicate it to others in a dimensional format, with the hope that it can be beneficial to the community as well as myself.
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Live LARGE
Medium: Steel, Stainless steel, recycled parts
Artist's Description
'Live Large' is based on a small sculpture that I made in 2017 when I was deciding to go into metalwork full time. The idea is to embrace living large by living fully. It doesn't take riches to be happy and wealthy. Small everyday things are what makes life, enjoy the journey.
Artist's Statement
Hey! I'm a metal artist native to Florida. I have been welding and producing artwork of some sort most of my life. As a full time welder and metal artist, I enjoy creating sculpture from recycled material to bring joy to the viewers. I blend various types of metal together to make the unique concepts and thoughts that I have while welding. Hope you enjoy my work, and stay tuned for new pieces to come!
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Perspective Portals
Medium: Steel
Artist's Description
Perspective Portals continues to explore viewing our situation, and to a greater extent, society’s situation from different perspectives. These sculptures, much like our lives, will change how you view your surroundings or situation based on how you look at it. You may not find one view particularly good or interesting, but a shift in your perspective will change what you see, how you see it and most importantly that you can control how you view the world around you.
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Vuida
Medium: Steel, siliconized fabric, fiberglass, aluminum screen, lace
Artist's Description
Giant flower with a reference to a woman in mourning.
Artist's Statement
I am a sculptor in Athens, Georgia with a Masters of Fine Arts/Sculpture from Indiana University and undergraduate studies at UGA. My work is shown throughout the United States; including New York, Fort Lauderdale, San Francisco, the “Art Prize” in Grand Rapids, Michigan and abroad in Italy, Columbia, Peru, Poland, and Ghana, Africa. I lure the viewer in with luscious colors and materials to contemplate content in close proximity. My sculptures are hybrids, mythologies, and metaphors about flowers and plants. Science is my architectural inspiration as seen in organic flowing structures and constructs based on anatomy and botany. As an artist and educator I feel that art is an important social responsibility to create a response from the public audience ranging from delight; introspection; questioning; inspiration for future inventiveness, to the memories of things we saw as children that affected who we are as adults today.
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Einfühlung Loss
Medium: Aluminum, Steel
Artist's Description
This work is one in a series I have created about empathy and human emotional states. It is forged steel and cast aluminum representing my sister, the model. I used a life casting process to capture her state of being after going through a personal experience with Loss.
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Maman Quest
Medium: Painted steel
Artist's Description
This sculpture is a representation of my love for works of fantasy and science fiction and my admiration for the works of artist Louise Bourgeois, whose work often bordered on the fringes of fiction and fantasy.
Artist's Statement
My sculpture is concept driven and is often highly viewer interactive. The conceptual component of my work is often derived from some memory that was stirred by the shape of some memento that I have held on to since childhood. These things bring up thoughts and experiences that challenge me and guide me through the creative process. There are elements in much of my larger works that are derived from my love of fantasy, escapism, and pop-culture imagery.
My sculpture does range in size drastically from minuscule to monumental. Some of my sculptures only require the viewer to watch as they see themselves reflected atop a difficult and imposing staircase which could represent the challenges we face in order to achieve our goals.
In whatever way my viewer chooses to engage my work, I find that it is not always necessary to me that the viewer understand my concept, but it is important to me that I provide an experience that might encourage the viewer to see and engage with art more often.
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Urban Forest
Medium: Steel
Artist's Description
A cross between a skyscraper and a tree.
Artist's Statement
My work explores botanical forms, the lack of interaction between man and nature, the artificialization of nature, and the patterning that occurs in nature. These sculptures talk about organization and the chaotic nature within natural and man-made forms. I look at how items are composed and their many parts, then abstract their elements-keeping true to there inherit qualities. Some sculptures are more organic in form as if growing or flowing from group to group, mimicking ivy or spring flowers sprouting here and there. All a combination of a systematic organization of natural forms possessing a chaotic multi-layered visual effect creating a metaphor of our world, dominated by its rapid pace and over-stimulation.
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The Wild One
Medium: Steel / found metal
Artist's Description
The Wild one is my stylistic answer to "junk metal" sculpture. While I've created many large scale horse themed works, this is the first that incorporates found metal objects. The candy red finish is a metallic paint used for automobile finish.
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Nave
Medium: painted steel
Artist's Description
This sculpture borrows imagery from gothic style architecture by referencing the shape of a nave as naves were a recessed place for sculpture to incorporate into architecture. Nave offers a space for the viewer to become part of the sculpture.
Artist's Statement
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Angular Separation
Medium: Steel and paint
Artist's Description
This abstract sculpture expresses the universe, the interplay of forms, shapes, space, and colors. It depicts the angular separation in astronomy. The circular forms can be interpreted the apparent distance between celestial objects, as seen from Earth, it can also suggest their actual distance from one another.
The Diagonal forms are in harmony and a contradiction intended to give a sense of a moment in time and space. I want to engage the viewer in its meaning, symbols, and metaphors. The idea of this sculpture is to carry on the concept of time, the elements of the universe from the micro to the macro. It is a continuation on the theme of life and rebirth of the stars from the basic elements and gases that formed the planets. The colors and forms represent these elements and express my concept.
I want the viewer to connect with my expressions of nature by the flow of their line, their texture, and their visual temperature. I want to combine the science, aesthetic, history, and technical aspects of my work that will help the viewer.
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Covering three (3) blocks of Lemon Street between South Florida Avenue and Massachusetts Avenue, a visit to the FLOSC sculptures on the Lemon Street Promenade is perfect for a quick weekend outing or during a lunch break.
Added in 2022, an additional sculpture can be found at the Lakeland Public Library. The library's location, just south of Lakeland's downtown core, can be a leisurely walk or short drive from the Lemon Street pieces.
Which sculpture is YOUR favorite?
Developed by the City of Lakeland's GIS Team, the link above will take you to a GPS-enabled map where you can walk through the Florida Outdoor Sculpture Competition virtually or in person!
Powered by the Otocast app, you can download and install the app to find the Florida Outdoor Sculpture Competition tour with voice recordings from the artists talking about each sculpture.
Find it on Google Play | App Store (Apple)
