Dedication ceremony set as unity sculpture nears completion in downtown Santa Rosa

“Unum” — the stainless steel sculpture in Old Courthouse Square symbolizing unity — will make its official debut Jan. 26, the city of Santa Rosa Public Art Program announced Wednesday.

Meaning “oneness or together” in Latin, “Unum” is covered in words meant to represent Santa Rosa but in 32 different languages most commonly spoken in Sonoma County households, according to Tara Thompson, the city of Santa Rosa’s arts and culture manager.

Work began last summer on the $300,000 elephant-sized sculpture, created by Arizona-based artist Blessing Hancock, but the process to bring it downtown took nearly three years.

A delay was prompted in 2022 after members of Sonoma County’s Jewish and Japanese communities asked the Santa Rosa Art in Public Places Committee, which approved the project in December 2020, to reverse its decision to limit the initial number of languages on the sculpture to 17. Several community members urged the committee to expand the list to include Greek, Japanese and Hebrew.

In February 2022, the art committee voted to expand the list of languages to include 32, the most commonly spoken in Sonoma County households based on Census data and two spoken by the Southern Pomo and Coast Miwok communities to honor the land of the Southern Pomo People, on which the artwork sits, Thompson said.

“It was a great learning process for our community — the community voiced their words and we listened,” said Melanie Jones-Carter, vice chair of committee.

The sculpture, which resembles a curved 12-foot band, was created from water jet-cut stainless steel and LED lights. During the day, the piece displays the words from all sides as visitors are welcome to stroll beneath it. And at night, lights will illuminate the piece, casting different shadows across the downtown landscape, according to Thompson.

Among the 32 languages featured on the sculpture are Amharic, Arabic, Cantonese, Coast Miwok, Dari, English, Farsi, French, German, Greek, Gujarati, Hawaiian, Hebrew, Hindi, Hungarian, Ilokano, Italian, Japanese, Khmer, Korean, Laotian, Mandarin, Miao Hmong, Polish, Portuguese, Russian, Samoan, Somali, Southern Pomo, Spanish, Swahili, Swedish, Tagalog, Thai, Tigrinya and Vietnamese.

Work on “Unum” is slated to finish Jan. 25 and the public is invited to attend a dedication ceremony, with music and light refreshments, from 5-6 p.m. Jan. 26.

“I’m hoping the community loves it,” Jones-Carter said. “I hope it’s a drawing point to Old Courthouse Square and people feel inspired to see it and embrace it.”

You can reach Staff Writer Mya Constantino at mya.constantino@pressdemocrat.com. @searchingformya on Twitter.