Horse sense helps create ‘spiritual’ sculpture

When it comes to his sculptures, Norm Christianson thinks big, his most recent work being two horses — one 12 feet tall and the other nine feet — made of steel and bronze.

Christianson’s latest work is destined for the corporate grounds of West Bend Mutual Insurance, an open prairie-like setting behind the offices where employees can wander and relax. 

“These are huge horses,” he said.

The massive sculpture was scheduled to be trucked from Glander Metal Inc. in Saukville to West Bend on Wednesday.

Christianson, a Cedarburg resident whose sculptures can be found around the area and in Milwaukee, got the job through a competitive process. 

“I found out they were taking designs, a competitive thing, about three years ago. They were looking for something for the area out in back, a big field,” he said. “What I had going on at the time was just some horses that had kind of a spiritual look to it. They were looking for something historic and related to Wisconsin.

“I was in a tight spot because I had to get something quickly in to them.”

It was a year before he heard back from the company, and they wanted some changes.

“My original was pretty close to a life size, maybe 6 feet. But when I found out they had accepted my design they decided they wanted something larger, something they could see in the field (from the office building),” he said. 

Christianson’s design uses a stainless steel frame overlaid with sections of silicon and bronze — “which I work with a lot,” he said — leaving open spaces that can be seen through and giving the horses a spotted appearance.

“Like an Appaloosa,” he said. “The whole thing is like horses running wild through Wisconsin.”

Christianson built the sculpture at Glander Metal with the help of company owner Mike Glander and his son, Mitch, who helped with lots of the welding.

Christianson had previously designed a sculpture of a rider on a pennyfarthing bicycle, which has an oversized front wheel, that’s also displayed on the insurance company’s site.

Company officials had seen a similar sculpture at the Cedarburg Cultural Center, he said.

Christianson, 80, spent his career as a commercial designer.

“Later on in life I started doing what I really love, in about 2000,” he said.

That was sculpture.

He hit it big with his first work, Christ Arisen, a 7-foot bronze sculpture on the Marquette University campus in Milwaukee.

It features strips of bronze coming off the floating body of Christ as though emerging from the grave clothes.

He also sculpted the three musicians in the Paramount triangle area in downtown Grafton and one at the Cedarburg firehouse showing three generations of firefighters. — chief, firefighter and child.

The horse sculpture took him longer than expected to complete, Christianson said, his work being interrupted by hip replacement surgery. 

“This one was a lot of work,” he said. “Most sculptures I have been able to do out of my home and when it gets a little too large I’ve been able to go out to the garage. But in this case, I needed Glander because they have some wonderful tools out there to help me shape and bend. 

“It was heavy work. This is a project that did push me strengthwise.”