ANDROGENOUS, UNIQUE ANONYMOUS,

REVISITING THE J. DOE PROJECT

a portion of the proceeds benefitting the City of Omaha Public Arts Commission. Many corporate donors purchased the pieces they sponsored for display at their headquarters, while some private individuals bid on sculptures for their homes. (Buis recalled one sponsor who prominently positioned a J. Doe in her living room after winning it at auction.)

The project’s legacy served as a point of inspiration for more art in public spaces. One year after Buis’s project, the copycat J. Doe II appeared in Omaha with just over 50 sculptures scattered across Omaha. In 2003, Tour de Lincoln arrived in the capital with 150 miniature bicycles that marked the city’s first pubic art project. Artist Liz Shea-McCoy, who spearheaded Tour de Lincoln, said in the project pamphlet: “What I loved most about experiencing the J. Doe Project, and others since that time, was that one really feels the desire to explore that city, searching for the next sculpture and the next!”

Several more fiberglass “nexts” were yet to come. The Bemis Center for Contemporary Art oversaw a similar initiative by Alegent Health in 2007 with the O! Public Art Project, which commissioned 22 “O” shapes throughout the city. In 2016 the Nebraska by Heart project saw more than 80 heart-shaped sculptures installed throughout Lincoln to celebrate the state’s sesquicentennial. That same year, eight Horses of Honor commissioned to memorialize police officers who died in the line of duty made their debut in key Omaha pu blic spaces. Today, Swanson’s “Heart & Soul” is the sole J. Doe still on public display at its original site near Trader Joe’s at 103rd and Pacific streets. It’s become so much a part of Omaha’s cityscape that the artist was delighted to discover it had become a location in the popular Pokémon GO mobile app game.

“My daughters were playing that game, and one of the PokéStops was my sculpture,” she shared. “They sent me the pic, and I used it to make my business cards. J. Doe str ikes again!”

Augmented reality games aside, Swanson is pleased that her contribution continues to resonate with the public.

“I still run into people these many years later, and they tell me what the piece means to them,” she said. “It’s an old friend, an old piece of myself that’s still out there bringing joy. It’s a wonderful, wonderf ul thing.” maha artist Peg Watkins considered a piece of pottery she had created in 1978. The jar, done in earth tones and slightly tapered at the top, is embellished with three-dimensional cross-hatchings done in a rough style.

For more information about Omaha’s public art projects, visit publicar tomaha.org.

It’s easy to connect that jar to a cold wax oil painting that Watkins completed only two years ago its gritty surface also cut with crisscrossing, texture d lines.

One might think that Watkin’s work hasn’t changed much between the two pieces, but it has. The connections between that vase and the painting show that she loves the textures that she used as a potter and now integrates them into paintings primarily composed of oil paints and waxy substances.

“When I paint, I think I’m still a potter, because I’m concerned about the colors and textures,” said Watkin s, age 75.

Watkins, an early member of the Old Market Artists Gallery located in the shopping hub’s iconic Old Market Passageway, occasionally swaps pieces of her featured art there with others from her home. Among her recent works in the Passageway was a shallow square glass bowl with a blue center circled by iridescent colors that change when handled. A glass tray with a shallow curve shines brilliant with broad white and yellow panels separated by thin black stripes. Orange and yellow orbs dance across an oblong green glass tray. Two square, muted yellow-and-rust-colored abstract paintings are speckled with small dark r ectangles

Born and raised in Omaha, Watkins graduated from Duchesne Academy of the Sacred Heart and attended college there until its closure two years later. Afterwards, she married, had a son and a daughter, divorced, and returned to college in her 30s, this time at the University of Nebraska at Omaha. There, she earned a bachelor’s degree in education and a Bachelor of Fine Arts degree, doing her thesis in ceramics.

Afterward, she became a supervisor with Omaha’s Parks, Recreation and Public Property Department, helping to direct the recreation centers, pools, playgrounds, and other public works.

“I ran five or six community centers and the day camp at Hummel Park We also had a Sundog playground program. It was a good job, a fun job,” Watkins recalled.

During her tenure with the city, she also earned a masters degree in mana gement.