Butterflies (or Flight of the Butterflies)

Natalie Krol, 1985

Natalie Krol created Butterflies which was sponsored by Commercial Plaza.

Granite and concrete are the materials Natalie used to create this wall of butterflies.

Brea, California hosts the Brea Medical Clinic which commissioned Natalie to create the work of art.  The sculpture was completed in April of 1985. The artist went to a stone monument yard to investigate the sizes and prices of granite slabs that could be used to create a monument wall. When she decided what size would be appropriate, she made thumb nail sketches of butterflies that could be translated into sand blasting on granite. Using a heavy duty wrapping paper to create the full size ‘cartoon,’ she created a full size finished sketch to be translated into sand blasting on the black granite slab that she had chosen for the job.

The granite was six feet long two-and-one half feet wide and three inches deep. After completing the cartoons (including the work on the concrete), it took a month to build the concrete under part using a number seven pea gravel with three eight-inch re-bar tied together every four inches. The concrete was cast, and the edges chamfered (rubbed smooth), re-bar extending through the top to support the granite from the inside. The granite yard then transferred my design to the granite slab, sand blasted the work on the granite and rubbed white paint into the recesses of the sand blasted part. It took Natalie one day to transfer the second cartoon to the concrete and sand blast the design into the concrete, while paint was rubbed into the recesses of the design to make the design more visible.

The artist was given a fairly low budget to work with and this inexpensive design speaks of the hope and joy that she could place in front of a medical facility.