Library Foundation Names Winner of Public Art Contest

After months of deliberation, the Lakewood Public Library Foundation's Art Selection Committee has finally anounced who will design and install a on the front lawn of the library.

Peter Diepenbrock, a sculptor from the Rhode Island School of Design, was chosen out of more than .

His sculpture will forever change the front campus of the . 

Hoping to keep the design under wraps until October, the library is not sharing any of the plans.

However, according to a library's fall and winter program guide, the best part of the design is its "inexhaustable beauty and the endless number of ways it can be viewed and experienced."

Before Diepenbrock was named the winner, he met with the art selection committee and library director James Crawford.

Diepenbrock was impressed with the library, as well as the city.

In addition to having his work permanently planted on the library's front lawn, Diepenbrock will receive $125,000 but Crawford stressed that the money was privately raised after years of fundraising by the Lakewood Library Foundation.

 “I think this is really good, for the community,” Crawford said last month. “The message this sends to the community is that Lakewood is a progressive and open-minded place to live, work and raise a family.”

Following a call for artists to submit plans for the new sculpture, . 

The library’s board of trustees spent quite a bit of time working with the architect, Robert A. M. Stern, to choose the perfect spot for the art. They settled on the northwest corner of the property facing Detroit Avenue.

Meant to be a welcoming feather in the cap of the newly renovated and expanded main building, the judges were impressed with what they’d seen.

“As a committee, we have been thoroughly impressed by the number and quality of applications to the foundation’s call for art,” said Nancy Seibert, president of the Library Board of Trustees, in March.