In an effort to continue “spreading the love,” artist Dale Lewis has loaned one of his latest sculptures to the City of Northfield, MN. Thanks to Teresa Jensen and the Northfield Arts and Culture Commission, the 9.5’ tall x 9’ wide x 43” deep, 500 pound $38,000 sculpture entitled “Straight to the Heart” was installed at the corner of Highway 3 and 3rd Street on Thursday, October 15th and will remain there until late April 2021.

Dale Lewis, a Hastings artist, decided to make this offer to the City of Northfield as a follow-up to the October 6th installation at Armory Square of a collaborative tree sculpture entitled “Spreading the Love.”

Northfield fused glass artist Gerie Thelen collaborated with Dale Lewis to create the 8’ tall recycled metal tree (by Dale), covered in multicolored fused glass hearts (by Gerie). “Spreading the Love” has a simple message: Tree = Community, Hearts = Love of Community, Multicolored Hearts = All are welcome.

Lewis said that it was Thelen’s idea to collaborate on “Spreading the Love”.

“Gerie had the idea for “Spreading the Love” heart tree,” Lewis said. “We have collaborated on other sculptures, the most involved was a large sunflower sculpture where all the pedals are fused glass.

“I’ve made quite a few trees but had to engineer a way to attach the glass hearts,” Lewis stated.

By coincidence I was working on my big heart “Straight to the Heart” when Gerie contacted me. This one was all about the color of the material, it took me months to collect 8 bright red 55 gal. barrels. I decided it would be a nice fit with the heart tree and offered it to the City of Northfield for the winter. The City picked a wonderful place for display, in the heart of Northfield and it pops when you drive by on Hwy. 3.”

“Spreading the Love” was made possible by Artists on Main Street, a partnership organized locally by the Northfield Downtown Development Corporation and the City of Northfield Arts and Culture Commission. Funding and other support provided by Rethos: Places Reimagined, Springboard for the Arts, and the Bush Foundation.

“There’s always something new,” Lewis said. “I completed a piece using a 1940’s Case model VC tractor. I made a stainless-steel Rooster driving the tractor. The title for this sculpture was obvious, it’s ‘Chicken Farmer’ of course. It’s displayed in my neighbor’s yard on Goodwin Ave.”

Lewis is also working on two musk ox, a mother and a calf.

“My plan is to use steel banding for their hair,” Lewis said. “The strapping they use to band things to pallets. The stuff you see in dumpsters. If your readers have some, I’d be glad to pick it up!”

Dale can be reached at [email protected] if you have any donations of steel banding. He is always looking for interesting pieces of recyclable metal to work into another wondrous creation.