Posts Tagged With: Leo Mol Sculpture Park

Winnipeg, Manitoba July 16

Sundays are always a challenge when traveling. After you fit in time for church, many places you wish to visit are not open or have shorter hours. We lucked out today with two pleasant experiences.

Manitoba has a unicameral legislative body and the Manitoba Legislative Building is open for tours seven days per week in the summer. There is road and sidewalk construction underway here so our first challenge, successfully completed, was to find a parking spot. Helped by a friendly neighbor out for a walk, we found free, on-street parking next to the building.

Arriving early for the 1 pm tour, we wandered the grounds and admired the statue of Louis Riel. Riel was the founder of Manitoba, and a leader of the Red River Metis (people born of a union of men of European ancestry and women of First Nation tribes) and his story is well beyond the scope of this blog.

The 75th anniversary of CancerCare Manitoba was the inspiration for 62 four ton painted polar bear statues located around the city of Winnipeg in 2005. A number of the statues are still located on the grounds of the Legislative Building. It was a fitting scene as Chris has been enamored with the idea of visiting Churchill Manitoba to see polar bears, a desire not yet fulfilled and probably unlikely to be attained.

The building tour did not discuss the bears but did mention a number of other interesting details about the building. For instance, evidently the belief that the number 13 is unlucky goes back to ancient times. What we did not know was that the use of many series of 13 objects converted being unlucky to being lucky. Thus the architect has numerous style motifs which number 13 objects; decorative rosettes, stairs, light bulbs, etc.

Another story relates to the statue on the top dome. This is “Golden Boy”, a 17 foot tall, 3640 pound bronze statue that is meant to convey the message of coming prosperity for all Manitobans. He has a lucky story too. Sculpted in France in a foundry that was bombed by the Germans during WWI, the statue was one of few that survived the bombing. It was quickly put on a ship to the New World but the ship was commandeered to ferry war supplies. The statue was stuck on the ship for several years during the war. Escaping unscathed during multiple ocean crossings, the statue eventually made it to Winnipeg.

After the tour, we drove to Assiniboine Park, spending time in the English Garden and the Leo Mol sculpture park. Most English Gardens I have seen were staid and lacking in color. This one in Assiniboine Park broke the pattern. There was a profusion of color with a wide variety of flowering and non-flowering plants. It was a delight to stroll along the paths and enjoy the varying combination of plants.

Leo Mol was a Ukrainian born Canadian who set up his shop in Winnipeg where he produced sculptures, ceramics, paintings, and stained glass windows. Outdoors, the grounds have sculptures arranged among the trees and plants while a building showcases smaller works behind protective glass.

We came back to our room at Homewood Suites where we had leftovers from an earlier Italian dinner combined with leftover steak from my birthday dinner last night at Tony Roma’s steakhouse. Friday we had stopped at Goodies Bake Shop for some treats. Mine were all gone so we had to re-visit the store to stock up on their delicious apple jacks-sort of an apple turn over only twice as large with three times the apple filling.

Tomorrow it is an all day drive home. Then it is six weeks until our next trip; six weeks touring Montana, Idaho, southern Oregon and northern California.

Ed and Chris, Winnipeg July 16