Jess' Journeys // Laumeier Sculpture Park - St. Louis, Missouri

Saturday, October 22, 2016 by Jess 0 Comments A⁺ a^-

What, you've never seen a 12 ft. tall eyeball? You should probably fix that. Luckily, I know the perfect place to see one, Laumeier Sculpture Park in St. Louis, MO.

Admittedly, I didn't see the entire park. We just didn't map off enough of my visit to St. Louis to see it. We had to fit it in after pancakes, but before Ikea and the art museum. This was all after being awake since 3 for my flight from Atlanta. I'm sure my friend Kim was ready to see me leave after the whirlwind of a weekend.

My absolute favorite sculpture in the entire sculpture park was "Eye" by Tony Tasset. It really is a gigantic eyeball. When you look up close, you can see the red veins around the entire thing. It was mesmerizing. Of course, I had the song "Somebody's Watching Me" stuck in my head for the rest of the sculpture park. I've got one thing to say about that though, #worthit.

After you park at the main entrance and walk through the"museum circle" visitor center area, "Eye" is the first big sculpture that you'll see, and it definitely sets the tone for the sculpture park. All of the sculptures are so much fun to look at, and most of them are so gigantic that you can fully interact with them.

The one that is on all of the brochures and posters for Laumeier that I've seen is called "The Way", and it's by Alexander Liberman. This sits at the end of a huge, green field. The way I see it, you have two choices with this field. You can either walk around the pathway and look at all of the sculptures, or you can take off your shoes and walk on the soft green grass. I'm not going to tell you which to choose, but I definitely walked to "The Way" differently than I walked away from it.

There are lots of different sculptures here, and they seem to change pretty regularly. So grab a friend, a camera, a picnic, and a good book for a great afternoon.

What's really fun about places like this sculpture park is that they take art out of stuffy, intimidating museums and put them into the organic, casual world. Once you get art into this kind of environment, it opens up a whole different line of dialogue, which is so much fun.

If you visit Laurmeier Sculpture Park, remember the lesson we learned about Stonehenge. Look, but don't touch and most definitely don't try to write your name on anything or chip off a chunk of it to take home. You don't want to ruin this park for everyone.

My one regret? I didn't bring a kite!