There’s nothing quite like a trip to the ballpark.
There’s the noise of the crowd, a hot dog and a beer … and the game, of course.
And at Wichita’s Equity Bank Park, fans also can enjoy the large collection of public art inside and outside of the stadium. Even in the bathrooms.
All of it created by local and regional artists.
“They're all originally born and bred in either Kansas City or Wichita or Salina … so it's all pretty focused on this region,” said Elizabeth Stevenson, an artist and architect, and the public art administrator for the ballpark project.
It’s an impressive collection: More than a dozen works that are integrated into the very structure of the stadium. Murals, light fixtures, bike racks.
Pieces that interact with the viewer, like the faceted column on McLean Boulevard by Derek Porter.
“It's lit up by both traffic lights and just ambient sunlight,” Stevenson said. “And when the sun sets, the colors change dramatically. So, it's like that is constantly alive.”
Another viewer interaction piece is the fence along Sycamore on the west side of the stadium, where the image has been broken into strips attached to each bar.
“When you're standing looking down the fence, you see the image on each strip running in that direction,” Stevenson said, “and then when you're standing looking the other direction, you see another image.
“So, you have to be walking in one direction or another. If you're standing looking at it from the front, it just looks like a fence.”
There’s a mural of the Arkansas River that wraps around the grandstand titled “The Imposing Sky.” It captures the Wichita skyline, changing with the position of the sun.
And there’s a reclaimed work salvaged from old Lawrence-Dumont stadium, which used to stand where the new stadium is located.
“It was … almost a concrete frieze that showed somebody sliding into a base, and that's where the Lawrence-Dumont stadium sign was,” Stevenson said.
“A local artist named Brady Hatter removed that from it, from the setting it was in, and then reset it, kind of like … putting a diamond in a new ring.”
You can find public art throughout Wichita. The city includes money for public art in all of its major projects – like the Kellogg expansion and the new water treatment plant near the Sedgwick County Zoo.
“It is a really wonderful way to add value to a city,” Stevenson said. “And I think people respond to beauty …
“I think people … want to be part of a community. I think public art kind of provides a nexus for people to focus on in that way.”
