Voters true to his moose

Dave Clemons just wanted to have fun, and Spokesman-Review readers appreciated that attitude. They voted Dave’s Little Deuce Moose the favorite of the 26 moose in the EXCEL Foundation’s No Moose Left Behind project.

They liked “the taillights on the fanny,” according to one voter in her senior years, and the yellow flames spreading over the moose’s red body. They liked the headlight eyes and car-grill muzzle, tire-like hooves and the moose mug-shot on the haunches.

“It’s so refreshing to see what people did with those crazy things,” says Glenn Vaughn. He lives in the downtown neighborhood and restores vintage cars for a living. “I just loved his, and I’m not a flames kind of guy.”

Little Deuce Moose earned 84 of the 570 votes cast in the weeklong online popularity contest. Monarch Moose, by artist Michael Horswill, was second with 57 votes. Every moose received at least one vote, even Rocky and Bullwinkle, which was stolen last month.

The moose in all their finery hit street corners and Coeur d’Alene business entries in May. EXCEL raises money for Coeur d’Alene School District programs and projects that don’t fit into the budget. The nonprofit group courted artists for proposals, accepted 26, found sponsors to cover costs and plans to auction the creative moose and their miniatures in September.

When Dave received the letter seeking proposals, “I saw the opportunity to have some silly fun,” he says.

Dave’s a hard-working artist whose sculptures grace the Centennial Trail and the Coeur d’Alene Police Department. He just finished a sculpture for a North Carolina high school and is working on sculptures welcoming visitors to Wenatchee. He’s also sculpting an artistic granite bench for the public to use at Seventh and Front streets.

He loves his work, but he was ready for a project that taps his lighter side. He visualized the life-size fiberglass moose as a hot rod. Dave had attended every Car d’Lane since 1989, fascinated with the detailed artwork painted on the car bodies.

“This area has appreciation for old automobiles,” he says. “It’s a distinctive part of the culture around here.”

To Dave, the moose looked like a ‘42 Ford, a car he knew hot rod lovers consider the ultimate. “Little Deuce Coupe” by the Beach Boys ran through Dave’s mind until he heard it as Little Deuce Moose. He knew what to propose to EXCEL.

The flamed red moose with the spooky headlight eyes evolved as Dave worked. He scratched his idea for wheels and a driver’s seat and went wild with yellow flames edged with blue. Rather than pinstriping the flames, Dave painted the moose blue first and left enough to outline the flames when he covered the moose in scarlet.

“I wanted to be as outrageous as possible,” he says to explain the red.

Dave had no idea his moose would attract much attention until he loaded the finished piece into a pickup to deliver to EXCEL. As he drove along Sherman Avenue, people stopped, pointed and smiled. The response confirmed his belief that artists should give people what they want, not expect people to learn to like what artists produce.

“With a commercial art background, I don’t wait until I find a project that moves me,” Dave says. “I look at a project and think how I can do something moving from it.”

Art entered Dave’s life as a practical craft. An illustrator he met in high school showed Dave how he used his skills to convey clients’ messages. Practical art hooked Dave’s interest. He put the degree he earned in illustration to work designing movie posters in Los Angeles. He loved applying his skills to new media – computers, clay, paint, rock.

When Coeur d’Alene wanted public art for its new police station in 2000, Dave proposed a giant eagle.

“It was the first public art program for the area. I wanted to be part of it. It was wonderful,” he says.

His proposal won. Dave sculpted his 400-pound eagle behind a storefront window in downtown Coeur d’Alene. Shoppers chatted with him as he worked. Kids offered to help. Art belonged to the masses that whole summer. Now, his eagle perches over the entrance to the police station with its wings spanning 15 feet.

The idea of public art caught on in Coeur d’Alene. The Centennial Trail Foundation received a grant in 2002 for public art because it won designation as a historical trail. Dave proposed sculptures showing people doing the same recreational activities a century ago that they do now. His proposal won. He sculpted a 19th century photographer for Higgens Point and a woman cyclist in a long dress with her dog near the trail’s Spokane River bridge.

The foundation didn’t have much money for the artwork, so Dave worked in reinforced concrete with a fiberglass shell. They were new materials for him and satisfied his philosophy to create his best work cost-efficiently.

He sculpted the figures in the Plaza Shops where shoppers could watch. While he worked, a man from North Carolina began telling him about his son, Will Johnson, who had died in 2001 from a sudden heart malfunction. Will was playing in a high school football game. The loss inspired the man to start a ministry advocating living life to the fullest. The ministry wanted a sculpture of Will at the high school. The man asked Dave if he’d do the job.

Last August, Dave, his wife, Sandy, and four kids flew to Harrells, N.C., for six weeks. The kids attended local schools. Dave sculpted Will kneeling in his football uniform for Harrells Christian High School. Again, he used reinforced concrete with a fiberglass shell so the ministry could afford a life-size sculpture.

Dave illustrates, designs ads, animates, sculpts, paints and teaches, but public art projects dominate his workload now. His proposal to design a bench for Coeur d’Alene from a granite block was one of eight accepted. He’s working on Wenatchee’s monument now and has proposals in for projects from Florida to Oregon.

The EXCEL moose project proves to Dave the public’s delight in approachable art. EXCEL first put Little Deuce Moose at the intersection of Prairie Avenue and U.S. Highway 95. Without notifying Dave, EXCEL moved his moose downtown for Car d’Lane in mid-June. People noticed its absence immediately and called Dave.

“Is this Dave, maker of the moose? I called to say your moose was stolen,” a good Samaritan caller told him.

Dave didn’t panic, but he knew vandals had hit other moose and stolen one. Someone had shot the nose off his photographer sculpture on the Centennial Trail. Dave was heading downtown with Sandy for Car d’Lane and didn’t change his plans. They arrived in time for the parade. His moose was in it.

Little Deuce Moose stands at Sixth Street and Sherman Avenue now. Drivers routinely pull over to photograph it. Strollers marvel at how Dave worked a car grill so neatly into the moose’s face. His moose is a clear winner with the public. Spokesman-Review readers said so.

“I like to think people genuinely liked it and voted for it,” Dave says. “Either that or it was the little old ladies with fantasies of flames on their Oldsmobiles.”