A friend of artist George Lundeen wrote to him recently and got a bit of history on the Valentine sculpture that sits in front of the old Courthouse in Decatur, after a picture was submitted to DM late last year (see above) of the same sculpture sitting tranquilly in Carmel, California.  Mr. Lundeen was kind enough to provide a short history of the piece…

“The Valentine in Carmel was the first and only sculpture Carmel had for many years. The first in the edition went to a fellow who called one day and said he wanted to buy a sculpture for his show store. He described a piece I had done a few years before (Departure) and I had to tell him I had sold out of that piece. As we talked, I told him I had always wanted to do another sculpture of the same people in the first sculpture, but 50 years later. He went along with the plan. I then asked him about his shoe store and I said I thought it was an expensive piece to put in front of the store. He said it would look good there. I then asked him the name of his store and he said it was “Nike”.  I was speaking with Phil Knight or as he said, I should call him “Buck”. That was the first one. Most of the edition of 21 are in private collections…one was resold a few months ago in Beaver Creek Colorado and was sent to Mexico. The one in Carmel, recently lost it’s valentine and I had to go out and fit her with a new one.”

Decatur’s Valentine sculpture was dedicated to outgoing mayor Bill Floyd and his wife for their years of service to Decatur back in 2008.

Eye on the Street photo courtesy of John