There’s a new sculpture on the Bangor Waterfront called “Living Water” by Mi’kmaq artist Steven Francis Hooke. The art sculpture is a six-foot Wabanaki-style canoe, affixed to the Davis Brook Stack.
Members of the public, including the media, are invited to an installation ceremony on Friday, June 2nd at 3:30 pm, on site at the Davis Brook stack located on the waterfront. The ceremony will feature remarks from the artist, Council Chair Richard Fournier, Director of Economic Development Anne Krieg, and Commission on Cultural Development Chair Aubrae Filipiak.
The contractor responsible for building the Davis Brook Stack, S.E. MacMillan, donated $10,000 to the City to transform the structure into a piece of sculptural public art. The City’s Commission on Cultural Development sought proposals from artists for an art installation on the stack that would highlight the Penobscot River, New England’s second largest river system. They were particularly interested in proposals that would emphasize the river’s cultural significance for indigenous peoples and also its historical significance to the growth and development of Bangor.
Artist Steven Francis Hooke’s proposal and design was selected from a number of submissions and recommended by the Commission for final approval by the City Council. It features a traditional Wabanaki-style canoe with its nose pointed upstream, which Hooke said represents the unwritten future.
Hooke, the grandson of acclaimed Mi’kmaq artist Carmen Hooke, is a member of the Mi’kmaq tribe of the Wabanaki Confederation. He shared that, growing up in Bangor, the river “meant an incredible amount to me. It would be an honor to be able to represent this significance with an art piece on these very shores.”
Please join us to celebrate the installation of this beautiful sculpture and to recognize gifted artist, Steven Francis Hooke.
The Davis Brook stack is part of the recently completed 3.8-million-gallon sewage overflow tank project called the Davis Brook Combined Sewer Overflow Storage Tank project.