St. Charles celebrates Ekwabet
The Native American stares off to the West.
His long hair flows behind him as a peace pipe rests in his left hand.
He's 15-feet tall and he's made of bronze. This is Ekwabet.
Ekwabet has watched over the Fox River in St. Charles since 1988.
"I immersed myself in the culture, looking for things to add to the sculpture," said Guy Bellaver, the sculptor of Ekwabet. "I was hoping to have something of a proud nature (on the sculpture). He was concerned with his people's plight."
This weekend the city will commemorate his 20th anniversary with events in and around Pottawatomie Park that celebrate St. Charles' Native American history.
During the late 1700s, the Potawatomi were forced south to the land that is now St. Charles. In 1915, a sculpture representing that history was built but vandalism and aging forced its removal in the 1970s.
In the mid-1980s Bellaver, who began sculpting in 1974, was asked to replace the statue. That's where the $90,000 statue Ekwabet -- "watching over" in Potawatomi -- came in.
"I did some research on the Fox River and the Potawatomi," he said. "I went to the Museum of Natural History (in Chicago) and saw a collection of artifacts."
The celebration will begin today with a third-grader powwow in Pottawatomie Park. Eleven area elementary schools will attend.
The children will visit the sculpture then head to Arcada Theatre, 105 E. Main St., where the Waswagoning Dance Theatre from Wisconsin will perform traditional Native American dances.
The students will then visit a "Day in the Life" exhibit. The exhibit consists of a live Native American village.
"I would think this would be a phenomenal learning opportunity for kids," said Elizabeth Bellaver, Guy's wife and organizer of the celebration. "Everything they're seeing and hearing is authentic."
Ekwabet's 20th birthday party will be Saturday, five days shy of his actual anniversary. It will start at 2 p.m. and will include a rededication of the statue. Waswagoning will perform at 2:30 p.m. in the park's pavilion.
Last year, Elizabeth Bellaver called several people in hopes of finding a committee for the celebration.
The statue's importance to the community has deeper meaning than just the historical side of it, she said.
"(Ekwabet's) meaning is it was the first major public art project in St. Charles," she said. "It was a catalyst to see more public art coming to St. Charles."
She said she increased the scope of the celebration instead of hosting a standard ceremony because of St. Charles' fine arts community.
"The thing is, do you want to try and celebrate some of those things or just eat doughnuts and we all go home?" she said.
As Guy Bellaver passes the statue, he often tells himself he has never seen the statue before. This allows him to see it as a fresh piece of work every time. But he will not judge whether he captured what they asked him to.
"I think part of being an artist is you always try to do a little bit better than the last time," he said. "(But) I think I tried to do the best I can."