Student Students lead initiative to bring art sculptures back to campus
Kayla Dougherty, UNF Student Government vice president, spearheaded a recent initiative to return some iconic aquatic animal sculptures to the UNF campus.
Dougherty recalled one highlight of her freshman year experience was seeing the fun smiling giant goldfish sculpture swimming in the water outside of the UNF Carpenter Library. But over the years, the sculpture was removed due to weather precautions and placed into storage. When Dougherty joined Student Government, she made it one of her minor goals to help the sculpture return to campus to save that UNF art tradition to share some joy with others.
Dougherty reached out to Jenny Hager, sculpture professor, to inquire about the missing goldfish. She organized students from the Sculpture Guild and Student Government to team up together and formulate a plan to return not only the goldfish, but also the shark sculpture, to the small lake outside the UNF Carpenter Library. These sculptures represent a fun part of the UNF campus experience and the students are excited for the Sculpture Guild’s work to be displayed on campus once again.
The goldfish’s official name is “Colonel Crackers.” It was commissioned for the One Spark crowdsourcing festival and created in Hager’s sculpture classes in 2014. The “Shark Attack” sculpture was created by Hager’s students for One Spark in 2015.