James Simon gathered lumps of clay and molded them by hand. Slowly, he fashioned a 6-foot-tall statue of St. Michael the archangel and cast it in concrete.
The new memorial, which honors Pittsburgh police officers Paul Sciullo II, Stephen J. Mayhle and Eric G. Kelly, will be dedicated Monday, exactly two years from the day these men died in the line of duty in Stanton Heights.
St. Michael will be unveiled outside Immaculate Conception-St. Joseph Church on Liberty Avenue in the center of Bloomfield. Set in a small park with trees and a garden, the sculpture stands on a three-tiered base decorated with ceramic tiles that bear the officers’ images. Behind the statue is a stainless-steel shield made by Forms+Surfaces, an international company with an office in Etna.
Last July, while the sculpture was in progress, members of the officers’ families and the Rev. John Dinello, pastor of the parish, stopped by Mr. Simon’s studio.
“I wanted them to have a final look at it while I could still change things,” the artist said. “The statue has to be expressive enough to carry these three families’ emotions.”
This version of St. Michael is a protective warrior with a watchful gaze. His left arm bears a shield and the right hand a sword. There’s a cross on his belt. Instead of a coiled snake, decorative scrolls that represent clouds are at his feet. Heightening this ethereal effect are the beautifully formed, textured wings. Besides police officers, St. Michael is the patron saint of people who confront danger daily — paratroopers, paramedics, fighter pilots and soldiers.
Bill Garrison, a first cousin of Officer Sciullo, recalled that when he grew up in Bloomfield with his extended family, “as long as you had a bike and a baseball glove, you were happy.”
Co-founder of the advertising agency Garrison Hughes, Mr. Garrison served on a committee to plan the memorial and was delighted with the sculptor’s work.
“He knew the deepness of it and he knew how sensitive it was,” he said.
Public memorials are fraught with pitfalls; that pressure can weigh on some artists.
I am hosting a benefit and I would like to have the proceeds go to the families of Officers Eric G. Kelly, Stephen J. Mayhle and Paul Sciullo II. Can you put me in contact with someone I can speak to about it?