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Alice Adams

Scroll Circle by Alice Adams Scroll Circle by Alice Adams Scroll Circle by Alice Adams Scroll Circle by Alice Adams
The Roundabout by Alice Adams The Roundabout by Alice Adams Roundabout by Alice Adams Virtual Tour of Maquette

STATEMENT

Alice Adams - Finalist for the Alumni Circle Public Art project at UCA Last July when I visited the UCA campus I was struck by the fact that the oval at the “Alumni Circle” offered the opportunity to make a place that focuses student activity and unites the paths and buildings around it.  My plan creates such a place, one that can become part of the campus community’s everyday life.

My plan for “Alumni Circle” establishes pathways across the site that carve out areas of lawn, terrace, and paved seating and gathering places that can serve as forecourts for the surrounding Torreyson Library, Harrin Hall, and Old Main. Three large willow oaks now part of the site will remain, forming as they do, along with the trees in front of the buildings, a green curtain, and, in season, providing copious shade around the perimeter.

THE ELEMENTS

The Lawn and Terraced Amphitheater
The pathways lead into the site from all sides, dividing it into lawns with sloping sides with elevations no higher than two feet. However, those that form the amphitheater are 4-1/2 feet high. The terraced slopes of the amphitheater are made of stacked Arkansas fieldstone with caps made of larger regular and irregularly shaped fieldstone. The existing slight elevation of four feet across the site can make the central mounds seem higher from a distance, while up close they are no higher than eye level. Maintenance of these lawns and slopes would not be any different from the care of the rest of the campus.

Paving of Pathways, Central Circle, and Seating Areas
The four wide pathways that would cross the site and central circle between Torreyson Library and Harrin Hall and between Old Main and the roadway leading to the site from the local street entrance would have brick paving in new patterns that I develop. The smaller pathways that enter diagonally are paved with Arkansas flagstone, as are the seating areas on the Torreyson side of the site and the seating area rear and under the willow oak in front of Harrin Hall. The circle in the center of “Alumni Circle” is paved with bluestone interpreted in semi-circular units on a central radius. I see this area as the stage for activities that are observed from the terrace, whether it be a performance, or simply students going back and forth. A circle of lights, whether LEDs or fiber optics, would be set into the center of the pavement.

Sculptural Seating in Three Areas
These curving bench and bleacher forms have a cast-in-place concrete form clad in precast colored concrete panels with bluestone caps. The seats allow students to gather in the sun or in the shade, and because of their form, are skateboard-proof.

The Planting
Rows of tree mark the place where the parallel paths used to enter the site, thereby retaining a shadow of the earlier plan. The trees proposed are ghinko on one side and Trident maple or dogwood on the other. One mature dogwood on the site can be accommodated or moved. Some areas of ground cover would be used in keeping with similar material like Vinca Minor used in other parts of the campus.

I would want the students to make this place their own, and I believe that it can absorb a number of activities, whether formal or informal. To this end the materials reflect the geology of the region and tie all parts of “Alumni Circle” together in a new way.