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What do you think about law? Not much. I think it's very decorative and attracts a lot of attention.
It brings good spirit. Irrelevant. I think it looks kind of junky. I like them. I have no problem with
them. I think it would be nice to get some around here.
It's ugly. Most of it's pretty ugly.
They're nice looking. I think lawn sculptures should be banned. I think they're evil and I think they
promote a really kind of thoughtless ethic in the American public. I feel they're wonderful. I hope
to make some when I grow up and I'm a working artist and think probably concrete would be the best medium.
Oh yes, I like a certain amount of things, the cement type things and that.
I don't like to get carried away with it. I think it depends. Sometimes they're tacky and other times
I think they're really interesting. Indispensable.
the cement and this thing and it's sand and gravel and fiber fiberglass fiber and then vibrate them
and shake them and and reinforce them if they need to be with wires or whatever no it's rubber latex
rubber uh-huh
We can pour one like today and tomorrow it can be taken out if it's warm enough and then it takes a
few days for it to cure out and to be strong enough to go out into the yard so that's why we have two
yards one for this and one for the other over there. We've been doing this let's see we're starting
into our 15th year. Kind of a whim somebody came in and
talk me into it more or less to say that we've needed to get into the business and we did and then we've
gotten to be one of the larger ones in it probably so yeah yeah it's a lot of work but it is profitable
bird baths are probably the most popular thing bird baths and fountains has gotten beef strong other
than that it's just small animals like deers and rabbits and that sort
Strangest, probably a little monkey. We made a big monkey. Um, have you had any formal training to do
this? No, no, we learned it all on our own. There isn't anybody that really will teach you anything
because they're always worried about competition, you know, which is wrong. I mean, competition is great,
but they're always worrying that you're going to take a little business away from them. So nobody will
teach you anything. You have to learn it on your own. Now I have taken a lot of people under hand and tried it.
We had some people in the summer that was from Indonesia. I don't know if you've seen the paper, the
ad in the paper or anything, or not the ad, but the newspaper came out and took an article on it. And
we had some people from Indonesia that we taught how to make molds and how to paint the stuff and so
forth. And they were very interesting to work with. They were with us for about six weeks.
just keep adding to it, it gets bigger every year. So how did you start or how did you become interested?
In the yard deal. People would bring me a little yard ornament and I'd set it out and I just got to
where I really enjoyed it and the more the better. What's your favorite piece? I don't know.
I like them all. One of my deers I like, the deer laying down. I got a tiger that my daughter brought
me from Texas. Have you had any
problems like vandalism? Absolutely none. We lost one little dog sitting over there and I feel probably
with some child that disliked it and took it. As far as stealing or vandalism, no. I think people really
respect, you know, what we've tried to do. We have people come here like once a week and bring their
kids in the summertime and we let them walk up, we don't let them get over in here, but we let them
walk up down the sidewalk, you know, act like they're petting the animals or feeding them and
You know, it's kind of rewarding for little kids that want to come back here. That happened as a funny
little thing. You see the church here. There's a lot of little old ladies walking down through here
to and from church. And we fixed our deck so we could sit up there. If we wanted to sit in our underwear,
we could not be seen. I was sitting up there one night about 8 o'clock. It was just getting dark. And
two little old ladies came up the street, and they stopped here.
like little old ladies with, they were pretending like they were feeding the animals. But they didn't
know I was up there. And they would say, well, here, doggy, you don't have a dog. And just a little
thing, and I'm up here just dying laughing, you know. Finally, I thought, now, I'll have a little fun.
So I just raised up. I was fully dressed and everything. I said, ladies, please don't feed the animals.
Well, they just went nuts. I mean, they was laughing and carrying. I thought, boy, that's an idea right
there. So I went and got me a board, and I have a router.
And I just made me a sign put up there and said, please do not feed the animals. Well, that's the way
that come about. What do you think about your husband in his yard? Well, he enjoys it.
I've got a cat, and some chickens, and a bluebird, and a water, you know, bird battle, like my bird
says here. What? A lawn ball. Lawn ball? What's a lawn ball? You know, those shiny things, those real
tacky shiny balls that people have in their hearts. I kind of like the little bees that sit on the porch.
Better than smaller animals.
some reason I find more tolerable than the big stuff. When Mary's out there and with her sheep and everything
and all the bright lights. Like whatever kind it might be. Well, my general attitude toward culture
is the more multi the better. You know, the more the better because
It's the diversity of different quirky things that are terribly important to keep up so that people
don't feel they have to conform to, you know, one idea of how, you know, what art should be on somebody's
lawn. So this whole range between what's utterly tasteless and what's genuinely beautiful or moving
I think is part of what our culture is about anyway. So I wouldn't want to make
interdictions, unless you put some blatantly racist thing up on your remote lawn. I guess, yeah, there's
some bad connotations about the little black jockey player.
Definitely the cow and the horse. Cow and the horse is the most popular item. How much do you sell them
for? The cow is with the calf, but there's two pieces, $175. There's the little calf. And the horse
is $150. What are they made of? Concrete. And the cow weighs about 400 pounds, and the horse about 250
pounds. So if you could make
a particular piece of lawn art or something that you would really like to see that's not made, what
would it be? That would be a kind of German type, the Dutch boy and the Dutch girl, since I'm from Germany,
naturally. That's what I would like. And the windmill and the bridge, that type of thing. That's what
I would like. Do people in Germany have lawn art? Oh yeah, a lot of it. Like what?
like mills, wind mills, and those little ceramic pickers like I was talking about. And that's just all
over in Germany. Would you say it's more in Germany? Definitely more in Germany than in America. I think
we are about 15 years or 20 years ahead of the concrete in Germany. Oh, do you have
stories or any stories that you know about people with Monard, anything interesting that you can think
of? Any really strange customers that have come in with bizarre requests? Or strange? Where we have
people coming in who ask for like a collar boy who goes fishing or a collar boy with watermelon, eating
watermelon. We're really not going to get into it because I think it's not fair.
to do that kind of thing. So we just frankly tell them we don't do it.
that experience it, I think it's not frequently encountered enough. I'd say that probably in Bloomington
there's as much as you'd find anywhere, but I think about what it really constitutes. It constitutes
individuals either as individuals or as families sort of expressing themselves in maybe you could say
a prefabricated way, but what's wrong with that? So I think it's neat stuff. I like it. What do you
think that the cultural
Let me pace a little while I think about that, the cultural implications of one art. Well, there are
several, and I think maybe they spill right out of what I said a second ago, because one of them is
if they are prefab, if they're the kind of things that people just go and buy, and I'm going to slap
this down in my yard. On the one hand, that's a statement, right? That's like drinking trashy beer,
because you like all the advertisements on TV, and you know everything about the taste of the beer.
But on the other hand, seeing as how there isn't that much
When you think about it, there really isn't that much, at least not on every block, except for perhaps
around Christmas time. But seeing as how there isn't that much long art, maybe it's a substantial, not
just a cultural statement, not just a social statement, but a statement about the way you see yourself
fitting into your culture, your society, your city, even your neighborhood. It's that kind of a statement,
too. So really, I guess it would depend a lot on exactly what the stuff was.
and what kind of a neighborhood it was. Somehow that would seem important to me. And also,
it would be, you need to talk to people and say, well, so what is this one in particular medium? And
if they tell you, first of all, that they got it at Kmart, then you want to know, well, OK, so how does
Kmart enter into this? How is this an expression of you? Does it need to be an expression of you? See,
in the end, I don't have a good answer for that question. I better pace again.
you can see. Of course, I've got them, part of them put up in the wintertime, but we really like them.
Well, some of them are set up up there in the flowerbed. Did you see those? Well, I don't have too many
more than that. How long have you been collecting? About four years. About four years.
We're not that, not that wealthy. Why do they do it? I have no idea. I mean, like here, you know, you
can have a live little
animal coming into your yard, but here's fake little things that are just there. Why? I'm just wondering
why. Everything mixed and you stand around and
You hear water dripping and everything, because the water drips out of these things after you pour them,
you know, because it's so wet. And you hear water dripping here, there, and everywhere. And it gets
so dreary in here. If it wasn't for the radio and the lights, I guess, you'd have trouble. But we enjoy
it. It's something that, when you make something on your own and you take it out of a mold, you feel,
you know, you've accomplished something when you see something coming. That's right.
particularly when you make the mold yourself and everything, you've done it from scratch, or particularly
some things that we have even sculpted ourselves, and you see it come out, it just gives you a different
feeling, you know. It's worth it all then. But then you have to part with it. Well, yeah, but you don't
feel bad about that, or I don't. You get people out there, that's what they want and they're happy with,
and that just makes you happier, you know. It's just something to work with.