LINCOLN, Neb. (AP) - Anne Burkholder was keeping an eye recently on a handful of workers, looking out her art studio window while they were affixing four panels of brightly colored thermoplastic to P Street.
When the installation was complete, the panels that make up the “Starry Night Street Design” covered the Haymarket street from the Burkholder Project to Lazlo’s - a “don’t call it a crosswalk” unofficial crosswalk that connects to the “Starry Night” alley extending to the west.
The alley between O and P streets near Seventh Street, with its painted walls and hanging artwork, was dressed up in 2015, its design a takeoff on Vincent Van Gogh’s iconic painting “The Starry Night.”
While they’re not identical to the alley artwork, the Burkholder-designed panels, covered with wide blue lines, swirls of white and yellow circles, extend the “Starry Night” motif.
“It had to be very stylized because of the material involved,” Burkholder said to the Lincoln Journal Star. “It’s not as painterly as the alley is.”
Thermoplastic, a plastic polymer that becomes soft when heated and can be applied to several kinds of surfaces, is the same material the city uses for bike lanes and crosswalks. It will adhere to P Street, and the colors should hold up as well.
Burkholder, who had long lobbied for a crosswalk in front of her art gallery, got city approval for the street design, provided it could be paid for without using tax dollars.
“None of it is publicly funded,” she said. “It’s me and my neighbors. It’s pretty remarkable; all the Haymarket friends and neighbors came together to help fund this.”
The cost of the street design project has not yet been finalized.
In 2015, the city spent $600,000 on improvements to the alley, a gateway from the Lumberworks Garage to the Historic Haymarket. Those funds went into the artistic elements, but also to repaving the alley and correcting drainage problems.
The street design is the latest improvement.
Burkholder, a pioneer in Haymarket redevelopment, purchased the building that now houses the studios and galleries of the Burkholder Project 32 years ago.
“This is almost a nice celebration,” Burkholder said. “I’m pretty excited about it.”
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Information from: Lincoln Journal Star, http://www.journalstar.com
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