By Steve Hubrecht 

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The Village of Radium Hot Springs will soon get a second public art mural.

In late summer eight artists submitted proposals to paint a wall of stacked concrete blocks along the Sinclair Creek Trail near the village’s popular bike pump track.

During last week’s Radium council meeting, councillors pared down the eight submissions to a top three, then a top two, before finally deciding to award the mural to local artist Kelsey Van Raay.

The tapered concrete block wall is about 25 feet wide at the base, 15 feet wide at the top, and is seven and a half feet tall.

Van Raay’s digital mock-ups of her planned mural feature a stunningly vibrant mix of brightly coloured natural elements: wildflowers, plants, butterflies, and a pair of Kokanee salmon amid a cascading waterfall plunging down the concrete blocks.

The other two top contenders were Jordan Collin and JD War (who last summer painted Radium’s first public art mural near the Radium Hot Springs Centre, which featured bighorn sheep and Sinclair Canyon).

War’s mock-up design for the second mural shared some similarities with his first Radium art mural: both feature an iconic local animal (this time a red-streaked Kokanee salmon leaping out of the water, instead of last year’s ram) done in sharp, bold shades, with an evening sky behind.

Collin’s mock-up design was intended to blend into the “soft and natural surroundings” on the Sinclair Creek Trail and features natural foliage, fossils and footprints from animal species unique to Radium as well as humans. Fossils species in the design include Didymograptus patulus from a rock formation found near Brisco, a Cheirurus trilobite from a rock formation found near Pedley Pass, and a fossil which Collin himself found on Radium’s Redstreak Mountain, which has not yet been scientifically described.

With a clear enthusiasm for local geology Collin noted that exposed fossils on Redstreak and associated rock layers are quite historically significant, but “compared to the nearby Burgess Shale-type fossils of Yoho and Kootenay National Parks, these fossils are more poorly preserved and less abundant, and as a result are grossly underrepresented in the literature. Hence, I felt an urge to display them here.”

At the Monday, Sept. 23 meeting, councillors discussed the merits of all of the various design proposals. They quickly selected their three favourite candidates, but had a much harder time whittling it down from there. Each council member clearly appreciated all three options, and they spent nearly half an hour deliberating over precisely which one was best. At one point, Radium Mayor Mike Gray asked if council could table (delay) the decision until the next meeting.

Radium chief administrative officer Adrian Bergles indicated that might not be wise, noting “there’s urgency with the weather changing” and that the mural is meant to be painted this fall.

Councillor Christi Ferguson-Houston said that since this is only the second public art mural in Radium, and since Radium council gave the first one to JD War last year, it would be fair to give the second to a different artist.

Collin’s design “tells a story about what’s in the environment,” said councillor Erin Palashniuk, adding, on the other hand, that in Kelsey Van Raay’s design “the detail is remarkable.”

Other councillors voiced similar opinions, speaking positively about both the simplicity of Collin’s design and the complexity and vividness of Van Raay’s design. Eventually all started to favour Van Raay’s, with Gray summing up that “sometimes there’s something to be said for having something more simple. But I think in this case I personally lean toward something bolder.”

Van Raay lives in Invermere and has already painted multiple public art murals around the Columbia Valley in the past two years, including three in downtown Invermere (the east wall of the Royal Canadian Legion Branch 71 Windermere District; the west and north wall of ION2 Progression Suspension; and the north wall of Summit Footwear) and one in Radium (at Ridgeview Resort).