“Sunday in the Park” Enlivens QC Riverfront Trail

By Jonathan Turner

One of the coolest sights in the QC is back for the warm weather season.

I was walking along one of the many great Mississippi riverfront trails recently and was dismayed to see the “Sunday in the Park” sculptures gone from their typical spot in lower Lindsay Park in the Village of East Davenport (south of River Drive and east of Mound Street).

After checking with River Action head Kathy Wine, I was relieved to learn they would be back for their fourth year Wednesday, April 23, after being stored – and restored – in the Credit Island Lodge. And walking among them on their 2025 opening day, on a gloriously warm, sunny day, they were as bright, shiny and spectacular as ever.

River Action worked with Davenport Parks and Recreation in summer 2022 to wisely move the collection of “Sunday in the Park” sculptures from Credit Island in west Davenport, where they had been since 2000. The colorful fiberglass sculptures are based on figures from the Georges Seurat masterpiece painting, “A Sunday Afternoon on the Island of La Grand Jatte” (1884-86), which hangs in the Art Institute of Chicago.

The pointillist masterwork – which inspired one of my favorite musicals, Stephen Sondheim’s “Sunday in the Park With George,” winner of the 1985 Pulitzer Prize for drama– depicts many ordinary people enjoying a day off on an island in the middle of the Seine River in Paris. How fitting that the RiverWay sculptures are set on 12 concrete pads along a Davenport riverfront trail. A sign shows the original painting along with a brief summary of the project.

Unlike the two-dimensional painting, you can literally become part of the scene here. It creates an illuminating art walk along the Mississippi River, set in between the “Architectural Park,” and John Bloom’s “Waiting for the Ferry” sculpture.

Public art on the riverfront helps create a “sense of place, a sense of identity for our community,” Wine said in 2022, noting it helps define the QC as cool, creative and unique. “It educates as well as entertains. It’s also something that delights and we know that kind of investment in public art is something that will create more investment in our community. We celebrate that – we celebrate the networking and partnerships we have in the community.”

The project (the first RiverWay art piece) started with Davenport artist Ted McElhiney, who oversaw the creation and production of the sculptures, placed on Credit Island in 2000, because it was an island in the river similar to La Grande Jatte in Paris for Seurat.

The sculptures were made by Thom Gleich of Davenport, with the help of Davenport Central and Augustana students who painted them with McElhiney and Ben Sunday, using techniques that were similar to Seurat’s pointillism (countless dots from his paint brushes).

Many of the sculptures on Credit Island had been vandalized several years ago, and for the 2022 relocation, were repaired and refinished by Jean Downey. A retired art teacher and artist, Downey repaired many cracks in the fiberglass sculptures, and also replaced pieces that had been stolen (including a book, cane, flowers and a horn).

Now celebrating their 25th anniversary, this immortal collection of historical art figures is a must-see for anyone who lives or visits the Quad Cities. Honoring an “ordinary Sunday,” it on its own is extraordinary, thrilling the viewer on many levels.

And having them help celebrate our world-famous riverfront is something worth singing about.

Jonathan Turner is a veteran journalist and piano player, who has made the QC home since 1995 and loves writing about arts and culture. He is the author of the books “A Brief History of Bucktown: Davenport's Infamous District Transformed,” and “100 Things To Do in the Quad Cities Before You Die”.