'Lines of Sight': UW artists forge an art and engineering story

A new sculpture in front of the Engineering Education and Research Building on the University of Wyoming campus has a big story to tell.

The sculpture “Lines of Sight” is a 14-foot, 6 1/4-inch representation of an antique transit, a device used to measure horizontal and vertical angles to help surveyors record geographic details.

The artists who designed, produced and placed the sculpture talked about its meaning and construction Oct. 9 at a reception honoring them and the installation.

Laramie residents Ashley Hope Carlisle, a UW professor of sculpture, and David Jones, an art instructional technician with the university’s Department of Visual Arts, described how their sculpture brought art and engineering together.

The $90,000 installation is a project of The Wyoming Arts Council’s Art in Public Buildings program.

In 1991, the Wyoming Legislature passed the Art in Public Buildings legislation, requiring that 1% of the construction costs of new, state-owned buildings be used for placing art in the public setting.

Carlisle and Jones, who own Wind Driven Studios LLC, won a competitive bidding process to receive a grant from this program.

Carlisle acknowledged that engineering and art are not always imagined together.

“Engineering brings science and math together to find solutions to problems that need to be solved,” Carlisle said. “Well-engineered objects are often beautiful objects and deserve to be admired and enjoyed. The engineering education and research building is so well-designed in every aspect of its function and aesthetics, so we were really hoping to add to this artistically.”

Making art, and sculpture in particular, is like writing a novel, she told the attendees in the building’s atrium: “Instead of words we use materials to tell a story, to connect to other humans.”

Before they could even begin the design, Carlisle and Jones needed a story to tell.

Charles Bellamy’s accomplishments gave them what they needed.

A Wyoming engineer and surveyor, Bellamy received the state’s, and nation’s, first professional engineering license on Aug. 8, 1907. Six years later, he founded Bellamy and Sons Engineering. Bellamy also helped survey the Snowy Range for its water potential.

Before the program, Shannon Stanfill, executive director of the Wyoming Board of Professional Engineers & Land Surveyors, explained that Bellamy’s work established a standard for professionalism in engineering and surveying for the entire country.

The artists learned from Bellamy’s great-great-grandson that the Bellamy family, with its five generations of engineers, had kept his transit.

“Surveyors can be considered engineers of their field, examining a problem so that a solution can be provided that can possibly change the world around us,” Carlisle said. “A beautiful instrument. That’s the sculpture. We just knew it was a winner of an idea.”

Carlisle and Jones see themselves as engineers as well as sculptors, making this project a “no-brainer for us.”

The new sculpture matches Bellamy’s surveyor’s transit, at least as much as can be included in a 14-foot representation. The Aug. 8, 1907, date is forged into one of the pieces on the compass.

The sculpture is made of steel, bronze and cast iron. The mirror at the bottom and the lens of the scope are stainless steel, polished to the point where one audience member said he still has trouble believing that no glass was used in the sculpture.

The compass at the bottom points to magnetic north and reflects the sky. The scope points toward the Snowy Range and reflects the buildings and landscape.

To scale the project, Carlisle and Jones spent months with fabricators making decisions on which parts of the original transit could be incorporated. The finished sculpture has more than 200 pieces.

“Most everything we were able to get into the design, and it was important to both of us that we were able to get as close to the original as possible,” Carlisle said. “This was not a time to abstract it into something else. This was a time to pay homage to that family and to that beautiful instrument.”

The sculpture was placed in May of this year.

David Bagley, associate dean for UW graduate programs in the College of Engineering and Physical Sciences, said the sculpture is a good fit for the college.

“Engineers are not typically well-known for their appreciation of art,” he said. “But this reflects history. It stimulates conversation: ‘What is that?’ This is the history of our profession. Other art is good, too; this is special.”