Located in front of Gasoline Alley Antiques on 6th Street is a mosaic piece titled
Lure of the Rogue created in 2012 by Bob Eding as part of the 'History Underfoot' Public Art Sidewalk Mosaics project. Each of four mosaics located downtown shares these common characteristics: 31.5" in size; Each design contains an inner circle that touches the four sides of a brick border and includes brass compass points; Each mosaic features a caveperson hidden somewhere in the design. (Why a caveperson? See
here). I could not obtain any information behind the artist who created this piece.
This particular mosaic focuses on the early days of Grants Pass, up through the end of the last century, when the logging and timber industry sustained the local economy, providing generations of livelihoods for local families and raw materials for local industries.
I was able to locate a news article from the Daily Courier That highlights the artist behind this piece and reads:
Bob Eding created a 3-foot-by-3-foot mosaic for the Grants Pass Ford Institute Leadership Class. The mosaics were permanently installed in downtown sidewalks in May. Eding, who’s known for his paintings and artwork at Evergreen Bank’s Bear Hotel and Taprock Northwest Grill, took on the mosaic challenge, as he’d only completed one on a much smaller scale for his home.
“It was like making a puzzle,” Eding said, only that it took much longer. About 100 hours were spent on the large piece of public art. His mosaic “Lure of the Rogue” represents Glenn Wooldridge, who’s known as one of the first to boat the Rogue River in the 1950s.
“He kind of opened it up so other boats could go down there,” Eding said.