By Rick Steelhammer
For HDMedia
Imagination-inspired artwork by nearly 200 students at Charleston’s Edgewood Elementary School is now on display on a series of 30-inch diameter metal discs that spell out “EDGEWOOD” and hang from a tennis court fence at Edgewood Park, at the intersection of Edgewood Drive and Washington Street West on Charleston’s West Side.
Last October, after being encouraged to tap into their imaginations and emotions — rather than the familiar and mundane — for inspiration, the Edgewood Elementary School student artists painted small panels that were sorted by color themes and transferred to recycled metal discs that formerly decorated a section of Washington Street East.
“What’s great about this project is that it not only encouraged kids to make art, but got their teachers and parents interested in making art themselves,” said Jeff Pierson, the city of Charleston’s director of public art, who, along with neighborhood planner John Butterworth, installed the artwork on Thursday. As Pierson and Butterworth worked, several drivers passing by the site rolled down their windows to shout their approval.
Pierson credited Edgewood Elementary parent Gabriele Wohl with the concept for the project.
2026 marks the 100th anniversary of public art in Charleston, which began with the installation of the statue of Henry Gassaway Davis in downtown Charleston’s Davis Park in 1926.
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