Former Virginia First Lady Lisa Collis speaks at the Virginia Civil Rights Memorial Unveiling ceremony.

After a series of speakers, who mostly kept their remarks mercifully brief in the morning’s heat, Gov. Tim Kaine, Nikki Giovanni and a few others pulled away the sculpture’s covering. Thus, the Virginia Civil Rights Memorial was unveiled before an adoring crowd at Capitol Square on Mon., July 21.

The newest monument on the grounds includes 18 bronze figures emerging from a block of granite. It sits low, on a short platform on the ground. People can touch it. Tourists and pilgrims can stand beside the figures to pose for photos. Children can play on it. It’s OK to touch it.

After the unveiling, sculptor Stanley Bleifeld’s art proved to be an instant success. As people lined up to congratulate him, his eyes watched the crowd interacting with his art, with his decisions.

Yes, it was good decision to not put the thing up high, on a big pedestal. Yes, it was right to have the block four-sided, with one of the sides devoted to the future. Yes, each vignette needed to be seen separately and as part of the entire statement. Yes, it was smart to have some of the figures emerging from the block to create motion, always a reference to the passing of time. Yes!

Art-wise, Bleifeld had hit a home run. Politicians and preachers smiled as they stood next to his slightly-larger-than-life bronze figures to pose for pictures. He could see that children were naturally drawn to the sculpture. As the artist mopped his brow, he smiled the smile of a satisfied man.

Having addressed the crowd Gov. Tim Kaine (center) stands ready to unveil the art everyone came to see.

Lisa Collis, the former First Lady, who spearheaded the project from its start to its finish, looked satisfied, too, maybe relieved, as she accepted the thank-yous being bestowed upon her. It had been her daughter’s question — Where’s Rosa Parks? — that had set the whole shebang in motion.

However, with all those happy faces baking in the sun, one particular politician was conspicuous by his absence — the nation’s first black governor and Richmond’s lame duck mayor, Doug Wilder.

Could he have been in Fredericksburg, tending to Slave Museum matters? Maybe Hizzoner was in an undisclosed location having secret talks about a new baseball team in Richmond? When all eyes were on Richmond, where was Mayor Wilder?

One of the four sides of the monument is about students “reaching for the moon” in 1951.

Kudos to the people Lisa Collis surrounded herself with to get this done. And, congratulations to the artist, Stanley Bleifeld.

Update:
Click here to read Michael Paul Williams writing for the Richmond Times-Dispatch on the unveiling ceremony. Click here to see the RT-D’s entire special section on the Virginia Civil Rights Memorial, which includes a short video.

And, STYLE Weekly noticed the absence of Mayor Wilder, as well. Apparently, Wilder’s spokesman, Linwood Norman, thought his boss was out of town. But Norman couldn’t say where Hizzoner was, or what he was doing there. Click here to read about that.

Update II:
Click here to watch and listen to a video at YouTube of the speakers (Del. Dwight Jones, Nikki Giovanni, Stanley Bleifeld, Julian Bond, etc.) at the ceremony. Then here to watch/listen to Gov. Tim Kaine at the ceremony.

— Word and photos by F.T. Rea