Robert Lash Sculpture

Sculpture incorporates river's work life

Artistic expression on Waterfront Park

GARDINER -- The three-ton base constructed of old cast-iron paper machine drive gears is centered on the Waterfront Park's Floodtide Terrace.

Now the hard part: transporting the 16-foot fabricated stainless steel form from Robert Lash's studio on High Holborn Street to the park without harming it.

A year ago, the Savings Bank of Maine commissioned Lash, a metal sculptor whose exhibits have appeared in a number of galleries, to create a 20-foot sculpture for the waterfront park project. Lash declined to say how much the bank paid for the sculpture, except that he did it for less than he would normally charge because he wanted to do something for the community.

Lash said the sculpture, titled "Rising," will be completely installed by the first week of November.

"It's going to be very exciting, but I'll be quite relieved when it's transported down there," Lash said Tuesday. "It's a very tall vertical piece that is a curved shape and at an angle. We're going to have to get the form from my studio and lay it on a flatbed truck."

Lash is still doing some finish work on the tiered piece at his studio, to remove any excess welding material and repolish around each weld.

"The satiny glow of the stainless steel contrasts beautifully with the industrial cast iron gears and corten base," he said during a recent studio visit. "All the painstaking welding, grinding and finishing of the pieces pays off in the perfection of the graceful lines, and smooth finish."

"Designing and building a sculpture of this size is a major undertaking, and is very impressive," said Jason Simcock, planning and development director for the city. And City Manager Scott Morelli said, "Gardiner residents should feel proud that our new waterfront will be showcasing the work of a talented local artist. It will be the frosting on the cake for this project."

Lash said he purchased the enormous gears incorporated into the base of "Rising" from the former Augusta Tissue mill when it was being demolished.

The gears range in weight from a half ton to a ton.

The base is a 8-foot diameter drive gear that weighs 4,000 pounds. On top of that, Lash placed a 5-foot diameter, 4-foot tall cylinder he made out of weathering steel.

"That actually sits vertically and looks like a shaft connected to the bottom gear," he said. "Then, on top of that, I've got a 6-foot-diameter drive gear also salvaged form the tissue mill. It represents the working industrial waterfront, and that's kind of a historical tie to the river. That comprises the first 4 feet of height. Then I have my new fabricated from of stainless steel as the new modern coming out of the past, and that's 16 feet tall."

Lash purchased more than 2,800 pounds of stainless steel at the start of the project. All nine individual forms that make up the sculpture have been plasma cut, glued, welded, ground and polished, he said.

Gates, Leighton & Associates of Brunswick, the waterfront project's landscape architectural firm, designed the floodtide terrace where Lash's sculpture is being installed.

Gardiner Mayor Andrew MacLean said he is glad to see the work of a Gardiner sculptor represented in the project.

"It's going to be a striking vertical structure that will really draw the eye," MacLean said. "As I understand it, the concept was going to create a vision of Gardiner's mill town history. And it was designed to withstand flooding. It will be something that we can measure what happens in the years the river expands beyond its banks."

Lash said that, as with his other sculptures, "Rising" is not a literal piece. Its form echoes natural shapes found along the Kennebec River.

"I am pleased to have this monumental sculpture installed in Gardiner, the town in which I live and work, and I am grateful to the Savings Bank of Maine for making it possible."