Sculpture by Bethel Alum and Student on Exhibit at Minnesota State Fair
September 03, 2010 | 8:15 a.m.
By the Office of Communications and Marketing
“The Beaver” by Chip Addington ’11 and Caylon Hackwith ‘10.
Two Bethel alumni have taken their passion for art and their care for God’s creation, and put them on display at the Minnesota State Fair. Sculptors Chip Addington ’11 and Caylon Hackwith ’10 created “The Beaver” out of the rubbish collected by volunteers who have removed the garbage from Minnesota’s public waters. The sculpture is on display at the Minnesota Department of Natural Resources (DNR) booth at the fair. The DNR commissioned the sculpture. It is the 17th Annual Minnesota State Fair Adopt-a-River Found-objects Sculpture.
Each time the artists visited the Minnesota and Mississippi river clean-up sites, they saw the evidence of the beavers’ industrious efforts, and decided to commemorate them.
“What initially drew us to the beaver was its ability to drastically alter its own environment out of necessity,” the artists told the DNR. “Our instinct as humans to manipulate our environment is not so different from the beaver’s.”
