The Iowa State Museum staff held an art walk inside the Gerdin Business Building to discuss the beautiful art that is showcased on campus. The tour was led by Caitlin Patton, a museum security and education program assistant.

The art walk first started outside, where the sculpture “Ice Blue” by John Henry is located on the east side of Gerdin. Aptly named, the sculpture is ice blue with a unique feature: depending on the angle you look at it, the piece appears to be leaning over. It seems as though the sculpture would be leaning one way and is lopsided, however, that just depends on the angle that you look at it from. 

Inside the east entrance of Gerdin on the right wall is the first of three colorful murals. These are the “Fields of Endeavor” by Rose Frantzen. The first mural shows three people from Iowa State at the forefront, these are the past, present and future of Iowa State business. Inside this painting are hexagonal shapes that show all the different activities that a business education can incorporate.

The other two murals show this concept as well. The paintings show gears turning, a downtown section of a town and even an entire city. There are also people working together and you can see the bald eagle emblem that appears on the U.S. currency. These paintings show the teamwork and collaboration that happens inside the business world and one of the paintings is focused on people working together.

The last thing shown on the art walk was the statue “Escalita I” by Manuel Neri. I thought this was the coolest piece of art from the art walk. 

“Escalita I” is a statue of a woman that is deliberately unfinished. Instead of being the average hyper-realistic statue, this one lets you interpret what you think of as the “perfect person,” and in my opinion, was the best piece of art inside of Gerdin.

The Iowa State University Museum hosts art walks every month. To learn more about art walks on campus and attend the next one, visit their website.