On our first official day exploring Des Moines, Iowa, on the top of our list was our third sculpture park of the trip. This one, which we would ultimately find in downtown Des Moines has 25 beautiful sculptures on 4.4 acres.
We had an address in our spreadsheet so we plugged it in and we were on our way. We arrived at the Des Moines Art Museum, walked around their rose garden but didn’t see ANY large sculptures. It’s a beautiful garden and we even saw a young deer up-close along a trail, which is all cool, but we weren’t any closer to finding the sculpture park.
We got back in our car and started to drive out of the parking lot as we were trying to relocate the correct address on my phone. Then, Kimmer asked a couple walking past if they knew of the sculpture park. They were very helpful in directing us downtown.
After a few minutes, we ran into the large sculptures we were looking for. We found a parking space a little ways away as the city had a music festival going on that morning. We hiked back to the the sculpture park and saw the sign for the John and Mary Pappajohn Sculpture Park. Out of all the sculptures, we enjoyed these the most:
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- Back of Snowman (White) and Back of Snowman (Black) by Gary Hume
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- Nomade by Jaume Plensa
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- Moonrise. east. January and Moonrise. east. August by Ugo Rondinone
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- Nomade Closeup by Jaume Plensa
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- Seating for Eight and Cafe Table I by Scott Burton
