WOODSTOCK, Ill. — Inside of his Woodstock studio, sculptor Erik Blome is putting the finishing touches on his latest statue. He’s brushing the bronze with steel wool.
“I’m trying to get that feeling of like a retouched photo,” Blome said. “I kind of like the metal coming through in places so you know it’s bronze.”
During a 40-year career, he has sculpted history’s heroes like Abraham Lincoln and living legends like Wayne Gretzky.
But the 58-year-old artist has never worked on a piece quite like the one he sculpted for Wentworth Park on Chicago’s Southwest Side.
“I did approach this with some conviction,” he said. “It really meant something to me.”
It is a statue memorializing Chicago Police officer Ella French, who was shot and killed during a traffic stop in Englewood in 2021. Her partner, officer Carlos Yanez, Jr., was also seriously wounded.
In four years, the grief has never faded for Ella’s mother.
“It comes at you,” Elizabeth French said. “I’ll be going along just fine, and something will trigger a memory or whatever and then there’s just this intense wave of sadness, then you just keep moving forward.”
To help with her grief, Elizabeth French started a non-profit in Ella’s honor called Light the Line. The organization supports on-duty police officers with a mobile wellness unit that travels around the city to provide services, resources, and meals to on-duty police officers.
Elizabeth French said Ella was a “chatterbox,” who connected with just about everybody.
“Her personality,” Elizabeth said, “As she got older and matured, her sense of wanting to help somewhere in the world, it just made a lot of sense to me.”
Ella French was beloved by her fellow officers.
One month before her death, she helped save the life of a one-year-old who was shot. She rushed the infant to Comer Children’s Hospital, never leaving the baby’s side, eventually escorting her on a gurney to the emergency room in a moment captured by a WGN camera.
She was also one of the officers involved in the mistaken raid on the home of social worker Anjanette Young. Young praised Ella for showing her dignity and respect.
“All I know is that in some way shape or form that she touched people to the point that they feel called to do this,” she said.
The idea for the statue came from Chicago City Council members Marty Quinn and Silvana Tabares and from the Fraternal Order of Police.
It’s a passion project that started one year ago in Blome’s studio.
“That’s what I was trying to show the humanity of her,” Blome said. “Making a piece of artwork, you can focus on that more. Bring that out. That’s kind of what I think the virtue of art is.”
His talent is bringing bronze to life. He referenced French’s uniform and vest, and using dozens of photos he crafted a likeness.
“I wanted to cup her face, because she just looked so real to me,” Elizabeth French said.
But to imbue the statue with Ella’s essence, he had to show how she connected, she was so loved because she so freely gave it to others, especially her pet pit bull, Bella. The inclusion of her pet on the pedestal indicates Ella’s empathy, according to her mother.
“Her empathy for all creatures, and especially her empathy for big dogs,” she said.
Last week, the 800-pound slightly larger than life sculpture was delivered to Wentworth Park in Chicago’s Garfield Ridge neighborhood. It will stand as a monument to one of Chicago’s everyday heroes, and one of only a handful of statues depicting women in the city.
“The small things you do, the way you contribute on a daily basis are what make you great,” Blome said. “You don’t have to be famous.”
The statue will be publicly unveiled on August 31. It would have been Ella’s 34th birthday.
“It was like a wonderful sad moment to see this,” Elizabeth French said. “She’s just a statue now and I can’t reach out and touch her anymore.”
(Except for the headline, this story has not been edited by PostX News and is published from a syndicated feed.)
