NEWS photo Terry Peters

‘NORTH VANCOUVER City parks manager Bill Granger checks
the damaged back of a sculpture slated for removal.

taco!

Wednesday, April 17, 1996 ~ North Shore News —

ining harpist

deemed a danger

North Vancouver City
to move statue to a
warm and dry place

By Michael Becker
News Editor

THE HARP lady is cracking up.

An unkind hand has left 4 nasty blue blotch on her
forehead, right smack in the middle, just above where
the long nose begins.

The left shoulder is falling away. The weight of the
inclined head and sad empty face are giving in to the
relentless pull of gravity on this gray day. Deep cracks
run the length of her torso.

The frozen musical gesture implicit in the pluck of

string falls short. Rusty bone of finger is bare to the -

damp, truncated by some fiend of the night.

The indignity continues.

Her toes are crumbling. Below and all around her the
base is disintegrating. Dank elements conspire against
the lady. When she’s cold she shrinks a bit. She bounces
back when she’s warm. That’s bad news if she’s wet.

Entropy has set in.

Most people walk by without even glancing in her
direction. She is an aberration, an artistic statement, yet
mostly invisible.

Nearby, a restaurant stands without fissure despite
the wear of hungry thousands and the passage through it

of much meat and salad.

Bruce Adair, a 23-year-old bartender at the North
Vancouver Keg works close to the lady. He can take her
or leave her. .

“Tt was OK in its time. Right now it’s not that artis-
tic. I've seen a few people look at it but mostly it's kids
playing on it. Puta playground in there. You get more
kids playing on it than adults looking at it,” he says.

Less than four years ago she was a wonder to be cel-
ebrated. North Shore Rhapsody they called her.

North Vancouver City Mayor Jack Loucks and coun-
cil officially unveiled her May 23, 1992. as a gift to the

community, a part of the art in public places program.

Together with Joe Bustemente Trumpet, a few feet to
the south, she has provided an oddly whimsical break
from the bland architecture near Rogers Plaza, just
above Esplanade and directly across from fortress
ICBC.

The sculptures were made by Richard
Wojciechowski, a Polish artist who came to live in
Canada. Total price paid for the installed work in 1991:
$36,000. Wojciechowski pocketed $27,000 for his
efforts and the city thought it had a good deal.

Concrete and steel would stand the test of time.

Wrong.

The seated harpist is dropping chunks of the stuff.

“| think the sense was that it's concrete, it would be
permanent, and that it was a sculpture obtained at a very
good price,” said Bill Granger, North Vancouver City
parks manager.

“The sculptor’s estimate of what it was worth was
$150,000. He was very well known in his native Poland

and it appeared to be a wonderful opportunity for the -

city to begin a public art program.”

So far so good i in the case of the trumpet, though. It’s
a big horn and hand immonrtalizing a former Chilean
mariner who blew hard on foggy North Vancouver days
a long time-ago to direct the ferry captain to the wharf.

Granger asked ‘council on. Monday to haul the harp
lady out of the plazs.-They agreed. She's unsound, verg-
ing on rubble and beyond a quick patch-up job. ~

She cracked during the first winter... :

Wojciechowski was' called -back'to fix her in 1993,
By the end of 1995 the sculptor wasn’t to be found.

The lady continued her decline. She’s dangerous now.

Granger said she should be put somewhere dry, but
there are no guarantees that she'll withstand the trauma
of lifting and transport to the. city yard. Regardless of
her ultimate fate, he thinks, she'll be replaced by’ some
plants at the plaza”

Granger still thinks, the ided to put the harp p lady i ina
public place was ‘sound, She ‘may, find. ani ‘indoor home
some day...

“Unfortunately the ‘materia! just hasn’ t t stood up to the -
weather. | think she’s a really interesting sculpture, and.
it’s sad that we have to take her out of Rogers Plaza.”

liracle’ coincidence amazes

From page 1

“The house had changed so much. It isn’t the
same and so it doesn’t hold the sume memories,”
said Swan.

. She did remember where her old bedroom
‘used to be. Now the area is Voyer's living room,
‘Voyer still can't believe that someone actually
found her tiny pendant and retumed it. For that
honest person to have lived in their new house
defies probability.
“She went to the same school my kids wert to.
‘ [t's too. amazing for: me. Te s:a miracle,” said
Voyer, 35.
When Voyer moved to the Vancouver area
. from Kelowna, she thought-she had left smat!-
town coincidences behind her.
“It shows Vancouver is not such a big plaice,’

&& She went te the same

school my kids went to.

It’s toe amazing for me.
It’s a miracle. 9F

— Georgina Swan

Voyer is the busy mother of four children, She
recently had a children’s book ‘published by
Annick Press in Toronto.

Last week, Voyer placed an advertisement in

the News, hoping to get her pendant back. Swan
was considering placing an advertisement herself.
She read Voyer's notice in a Friday News.

Said Voyer, “She said, fl be in West Van cn
Sunday, maybe I can drop it off. | said I live in
Pundarave. She said she lived in: Dundarave. 1
said I live on Nelson. She said she lived on
Nelson.”

When Voyer told her the address, Swan real-
ized that she had grown up at the same address,

“T could hear her parents in the background

going, ‘Oh my God, the old house’,” said Voyer.

Swan’s family moved out of the house 24 years

‘ago when her engineer father was transferred.

Swan declined the reward for returning the
pendant. The value is mostly sentimental.

Said Voyer, “Et really didn't think Pde get it
back. It is so tiny, [ thought it would be impossi-
ble to find.”

said Voyer.

North Van.
services
discussed

- From page 4

80% of the district has favored
amalgamation he could not favor
the “totalitarianism” of a district-
only approach. Instead, Munroe
pointed to existing city/district
commissions that work together
as a model that could be expand-
ed, He suggested a single dispatch
system for North Vancouver fire
services as an example.

Coun.. Don Bell supported
Munroe’s concept of a city/dis-
trict joint services committee and
was successful in persuading the
majority of council to take a fur-
ther look at the topic in three
-weeks.

. “We have to convince city res-
-idents of the benefits of harmo-
nized services,” said Bell.

Couns. Crist and Pamela
Goldsmith-Jones . opposed the
deferral.

Shadow cast over public
nature of police J proceedings

From page 4

plaint Commissioner Frances
Gordon said that when the police
board sits as an appeal tribunal,
“normatly,” it is a public matter,

“The common method of
appeal, it happens 95% of the time,
is the public inquiry through the
police board,” said Gordon.

But West Vancouver Police
Chief Const. Hal Jenkins was |
adaraant on Monday that the appeal
would be held privately, as has been
the case with all previous proceed-
ings involving the Mason case.

“{ don’t know where you are

vetting your information on the

public (hearing),” said Jenkins.
He added that every step of a
disciplinary process was private

including an appeai to the police board or appeal to the, .
: ing findings the week previous.

police commission.

_ Mayor Mark Sager, who chairs the appointed four: ;
“said Best.
Best said she is now considering asking for a public

member. civilian police board, was also under. the:
impression that the appeal would ‘be held’ in public
when contacted by the. News on Monday.

fn

WEST VANCOUVER Police
Chief Hal Jenkins ... says
Const. Glen Mason's appeal
witl be a private disciplinary
matter not open to public
scrutiny.

Meanwhile Mason was suspend-
ed for one day without pay for inap-
propriately using his firearm and
discreditable conduct concerning
the gun incident.

Five weeks after the incident,
Best. 77, wrote a letter of com-
plaint.

The 13-year resident of West
Vancouver said that she waited that
long because she worried her com-
plaint would be misinterpreted.

Best was informed by the News

‘on Tuesday that Mason had appealed the police hear-

“Tam really angry about this. It is as if | don’t exist,”

inguiry | into the handling of the affair.

,

@ Around Town.......... 18
@ Gright lights...........10 |

‘Bi Business...

Classifieds,
@ Crossword.

7 Fashion,
‘insights.

Hi Mailbon............. sesenecee wo,

@ Tabic Hopping
BTV Listiriges.

features

@ Home Imprevement:
Ins and outs of your
home and garden: 23

sports
@ Opening Day: West

Van Little League
takes to the field: 47