Artist Christopher Owens, also known as “StarMan,” was inspired to bring some joy, unity and happiness to Connecticut.
His current contribution is the Gracie the Water Dragon sculpture in Essex.
“In the cover of darkness and in a lifejacket, I assembled it with a headlight and swam it out and then pulled the flotation off and let it pop up into in place and put some finishing touches,” Owens said.
The 35-foot-long sculpture was recently placed on Sunset Pond in Essex. It took the Chester resident between three and four hours to put the four sections made of foam and aluminum together, using counter weights to keep it upright.
“At some point in the middle of it I thought, ‘I’m sweaty and bugs are biting me and I’m tired,'” Owens said. “Then I looked up and just saw the sky full of stars in the middle of the night and the dragon floating, and I thought, ‘This is exactly where I want to be, and this is exactly what I want to be doing in my life.’ So that kind of fuels me those moments.”
Sunset Pond is a man-made pond designed and constructed in the 1930s for ice skating. It is owned by the Griswold Inn and is leased by the town of Essex, according to Griswold Inn owner Geoffrey Paul.
“That pond was not designed to be an environmental habitat. It wasn’t made or preserved as a natural nesting ground for a certain type of wildlife,” Paul said. “It was always designed for human interaction, to bring people joy. I think the idea of public art, compliments very nicely the original purpose of the pond.”
For the last five years, Owens has used his talent and creativity to construct stars and a wish booth as well as 20 big dog sculptures up to eight feet tall that are displayed in Chester. Gracie initially was placed in Chester Pond.
“These are things that brought joy, unity and happiness, and last year I started with dog sculptures,” Owens said. “I’d made a 14-foot-long, 10-foot-tall black Labrador sculpture and about three weeks ago, I thought, I’m going to take one of my dog sculptures and make it float. But I made a quick drawing. And the floating dog also you see is the head and the butt. You know, it’s not really exciting.”
Then he was coming up with other ideas and he went back to his childhood. Owens thought of his favorite childhood movie, “Pete’s Dragon,” and three weeks ago drew up the sculpture in his Chester workshop.
“Pete’s Dragon was an animated dragon, a friendly dragon,” Owens said. “I thought, ‘I’m going to make a floating dragon and took a bunch of time off from work.’
“A week and a half later, it started testing it in our local ponds and I didn’t get a great reception in my own town (Chester) but I was invited to put it in Sunset Pond, which is a much better spot for it,” he said. “It’s a place for people to see it. I made something real, and I want people to look at it like a 6-year-old. Like you see something that is awe inspiring and brings wonder to your life when you stumble on it or you see it, you know, that’s maybe the 6-year-old in all of us but especially real 6-year-olds, they need to see, we need more wonder in the world, and that’s what I bring.”
Owens has received regular reports of children in awe of the dragon.
“It’s quite the response. It’s the response that I had hoped for,” Owens said. “That kind of viral wonder reaction and that’s happening organically.”
Janet Cummings a fellow artist from Chester, said she was happy the dragon found a home in Essex after Owens was asked to move it out of Chester. Cummings’ late husband is Peter Good, who designed the iconic Hartford Whalers logo. The couple arrived in Chester in 1969.
“I think we all ought to embrace creativity. Why aren’t people more curious? What is that in the lake? That’s really cool. Who did it? You know. I’m curious. Instead of looking out and saying, ‘Why the hell is that thing here,'” Cummings said. “Why can’t we just relax and enjoy each other’s creativity.”
Cummings said it was enterprising of Owens to bring his sculpture elsewhere.
“You don’t like me playing in your playground I’m going to play in another playground and maybe people overseeing this playground will be more receptive,” Cummings said. “If something doesn’t work, as an artist you try something else. You have to be flexible when you are an artist. People in communities like Chester or Essex are very diverse. People are going to love what he’s doing, and people are going to hate what he’s doing.”
Owens, a West Hartford native, said he was asked to remove Gracie the next day from the Cedar Lake because it wasn’t permitted, he but was happy it has a new home in Essex.
“I met a kid down there (recently) and he was fishing, and I said, ‘Did you catch anything?’ And he said, ‘Yeah, I caught a dragon.’ So apparently there’s been a nonstop parade of kids on bikes coming to see it and take pictures and people slowing down and that makes me happy,” Owens said.
“That night I put it up, I was looking up at the stars with my sculpture knowing that it was going to be a surprise and what a response, what a great response,” he said.
Paul has been supportive of the project and is happy Gracie is nearby. Paul said he had heard Owens was looking for a home for his water sculpture. “So, I contacted him, and he sent me some photos of Gracie the Water Dragon and it was just instant love,” Paul said. “I thought, this would be a wonderfully whimsical statement to welcome people into Essex, and Sunset Pond is the perfect platform for public art. I think of it as the gateway to the (Essex) Village.”
Paul said he would be open for more temporarily installations in the pond to “give people a reason to smile” whether it’s done by Owens or other artists. Paul said he would like Gracie to remain in the pond through the fall, “until she fly’s south for the winter.”
Essex resident and business owner Jim Clark has been a friend of Owens for years. Clark said he drives by Gracie every day in his community to his business Essex Detailing.
“I see people in that little park are with a little picnic table and everybody’s curious about the dragon,” Clark said. “People are standing on the lawn with camera’s taking pictures of it. It’s been well received.
“There’s something very contagious about what he does,” Clark added. “He’s just got it in him.”