With another one of his proud creations standing over his right shoulder at Laura Bradley Park on Friday, Preston Jackson, a Peoria-based sculptor, spoke to the assembled crowd about how it had a connection with everything and everyone, no matter their race, creed or character.
“Everything on this is connected to something,” Jackson said. “There’s life in this piece, simply by the fact that I use life models and people that I know. Their faces are all over this piece; Indigenous people, European-Americans, African-Americans, buffaloes; this thing is loaded. Everything connects in some way, but it would take a long time for me to tell you.”
Those connections are the key to understanding Jackson’s newest piece, “Never Extinct: A Pictorial History of the Indigenous People,” unveiled Friday at the West Bluff park as a replacement for a long-standing statue of Christopher Columbus, which was removed in 2020.
Emily Cahill, executive director of the Peoria Park District, said that there was a statement in replacing the Columbus statue with something that spotlights the many contributions of Native Americans, but she wanted to make sure that people found a way to celebrate their contributions to Peoria and Illinois.
“It felt very appropriate to us to do two things,” Cahill said. “First, to think about celebrating the Indigenous people that certainly mean so much in Illinois. Christopher Columbus clearly has a role in us being in Illinois, but really thinking about the people who were our pioneers and explorers when it comes to this space, that is the population we’re celebrating here.”
Cahill also noted that the first day of spring, which was Friday, was the perfect day to unveil the new sculpture, as it provided plenty of symbolism in the form of new beginnings.
“To dedicate this on the spring equinox is important to us because it does symbolize a new beginning for this space,” Cahill said. “We hope people can move away from the hurt feelings and the anger and celebrate what is an absolutely beautiful piece of artwork by someone who is renowned around the world for his work. To be able to do that here in his hometown is very meaningful for us as a park district.”
The park district commissioned the sculpture in 2024 for $100,000 to replace the Columbus statue, which had stood in the park since 1947 before its 2020 removal amid spirited debate. Jackson said that he took inspiration from his own Choctaw heritage and his thoughts about how people came to this area to create the sculpture.
“It’s my heritage, my own heritage,” Jackson said. “We came here just like everyone else did. The main thing is that there were already people here, the people’s souls and their whole being is into this Earth. We just happen to, through many events both good and bad, get to share it with them.”
Jackson said he wanted to fill the sculpture with as much meaning as he could, so much so that he said if he had to describe it, it would take too long for people assembled at the park.
“Never extinct, it’s like erasing a word in reference to a people,” Jackson said. “The whole idea is to fill these pyramid-like shapes with as much history as possible. Each little bump or lump or drawing symbolizes something, and it being made of bronze means it will be here a long time.”
Jackson said that the sculpture can help to set the record straight about how the Peoria area was originally settled.
“It just tells the truth,” Jackson said. “It just straightens it out. The truth will always be the brighter light. It’s about setting the record straight and I’m glad that I was able to do that in a visual sense.”
Jackson said that in a time of divisiveness and coarse politics, he feels that his work can provide an opportunity for people to come together and end hostilities, if only for a little while.
“The fact that we’re having such a strange political situation with our government, it’s terrible what’s going on,” Jackson said. “This is an opportunity to smile and look at each other and not feel animosity.”
This article originally appeared on Journal Star: ‘A new beginning’: Indigenous sculpture unveiled at Bradley Park
Reporting by Zach Roth, Peoria Journal Star / Journal Star
USA TODAY Network via Reuters Connect
