Arthur, Clifford, Harry Potter and Wonder now greet visitors at Walsh-Westgate Park, painted onto a little library by two District 218 students.
On Sept. 16, Palos Heights marked its opening with a ribbon cutting led by the Public Arts Commission and Mayor Robert Straz.
The mayor began by sharing the park’s history, once home to two golf courses tied to the Walsh family, before turning to the present.
“It’s a beautiful day for one thing,” he said, “but it’s also a great collaboration between a number of different organizations: the Public Arts Commission, District 218 and High 5, the police department, and also a local author.”
Straz added, “It’s just one of many of these little libraries we’ve set up throughout the city, and it shows the kind of cooperation that makes things happen here.”
That cooperation was visible in the work of Alejandro Garcia, a recent graduate, and Aidan Rubio, who is still part of the High 5 program.
Over three days at their training center, they traced, outlined and painted the box with the stories that mattered most to them.
“The book I chose was Wonder, which is one of the best,” Garcia said, a novel by R. J. Palacio.
“On the back of the library, I also had superheroes, which are based on our favorite comic books.” He admitted the whole experience felt a little surreal. “It’s such an amazing feeling. I never thought this would actually happen.”
Rubio described his side of the structure. “I painted Arthur, Clifford the Big Red Dog, the Cat in the Hat, and Harry Potter on the bottom,” he said. The hardest part, he added, was the detailed work.
“The most challenging part was doing the outlines, because it had to be really accurate,” Garcia quickly added.
“Sometimes when it comes to freehanding, it’s difficult – I agree with Alejandro,” said Rubio.
Public Arts Commissioner Tara Oosterbaan said the idea for the project grew from the need to replace another little library at the Rec Center.
Rather than discard it quietly, the Public Arts Commission saw an opportunity. “We thought, let’s put one at Walsh-Westgate Park, because that neighborhood doesn’t have one,” she said. “We approached the district, the students got very excited, and they came up with three different designs.”
Oosterban added, “They were all so good we couldn’t choose, so we asked them to combine the best of each.”
The most important part was giving students a chance to see their creativity displayed in public, Oosterban said.
Once the ribbon fell, Officer Lindsey Vanderlaan stepped forward to add the first book. She placed a signed copy of her children’s story, The Little Man in the Clock, onto the shelf. “It’s about a fictional little man who keeps the time running inside the clock of an elderly couple’s home with their cat,” she said.
“He feels unappreciated, so he stops doing his job, but then realizes how important it is and goes back to it.”
Commissioner Darlene Grigus called the collaboration “a fabulous project bringing all the different Palos Heights agencies and departments together.”
She said it adds “a little bit of functional art to the city and another feature for this park” and might inspire families to visit all the little libraries across Palos Heights.
The new library joins about seven others across Palos Heights, each one offering neighbors a place to trade books and, now, to see student artwork on display.
