Sculptures scattered on campus
There are many things about this campus that make me fall in love with it over and over again.
Among the most beautiful are the sculptures you can see while walking to class or wandering around campus.
There are more than six large-scale sculptures scattered around Queen’s. All of them are abstract and push us to wonder what they mean, and yet each adds something special to an otherwise lacking space.
Whether you’re walking across campus or rushing to a class, take a second to admire the public artwork our campus has to offer — many of the pieces date back before any of us would have been born.
Ground Outline, 1978 — Peter Kolisnyk
It’s not easy to miss the large white, rectangular frame at the center of Summerhill. It’s minimalist and abstract, and yet it’s hard to imagine the space without it.
Sculpture Peter Kolisnyk’s piece was originally placed at Harbourfront in Toronto, but was later moved to the Queen’s campus when Summerhill proved to be the perfectly dramatic site.
With the sculpture’s allusion to a picture frame, Kolisnyk’s piece draws attention to the scenery and beauty that surrounds it. One looks through it rather than at the piece itself.
Pyramidal Structure (Sakkarah), 1971 — Victor Tolgesy
Photos by Anna Maria Li
On the plaza west of Jeffery Hall, you can find a large, bright red pyramid structure. The sculpture, created by Hungarian-Canadian artist Tolgesy and commissioned by the Department of Mathematics and Statistics in 1971, epitomizes the intersection of the spherical form and
the pyramid form.
No matter what angle you look at it, the shapes blend together in a perfect symmetry. Though some would argue that graffiti dirties its
magic, I’d say it’s a testament to the sculpture’s test of time. It may not be pristine, but it was thought-provoking before the graffiti and continues
to be so afterwards.
The Three Observed, 1992 — William Vazan
Land artist William Vazan created these three large rocks with
intertwining patterns located on the front lawn of the Agnes Etherington Art Centre.
Vazan, according to the Queen’s University “Sculpture Tour” website, began to “rout granite stones in a quarry north of Kingston near Tamworth” in the late 1980s.
The engravings on each rock are reminiscent of the etchings of
ancient civilizations. They seem to suggest something primitive and
pre-civilization in a world obsessed with progress.
