the fields project Bringing Art and Agriculture Together
The Artists

About Us

In July 1998, at the 100th anniversary of the founding of Eagles' Nest Art Colony, a group of living artistsand interested community members joined for the purpose of continuing the heritage of artistic expression embodied by the original Colony. It was in this same year that The Fields Project, a 501(c)3 not-for-profit organization was conceived. The Fields Project's mission is to encourage an awareness and appreciation of Art to Agriculture and Agriculture to Art.

The Original Colony was founded in 1898 by Lorado Taft, an instructor at the Art Institute of Chicago and a group of artists seeking a place to take their families for the summer and at the same time create art in its many forms. Each summer they not only created their art, they shared it with the community of Oregon, IL. The Oregon Public Library was designed by architects Pond and Pond, members of the Eagles Nest Art Colony.

An account of the Eagle's Nest Camp - by Elizabeth Dickerson Palmer
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The top floor of the Library is an art gallery where pieces from the many colony artists are displayed. Among these pieces is the maquette of Lorado Taft’s ‘The Blind’ and “Blackhawk,” otherwise known as the Eternal Indian. Taft’s concrete statute on the bluff overlooking the Rock River, the sculpture fountain in Mix Park, and the Civil War Memorial on the Court House lawn are also part of the Taft and Eagles’ Nest Art Colony legacy.

In 1999, the first Fields Project included eight artists from across the US and Canada. An artist from Tucson, AZ, was the first to do a fields sculpture. Since then, there have been four to six field sculptures each year. Around 100 artists have participated over the last 11 years and forty-one farm families have shared their homes with these artists. We are an all-volunteer organization made up of artists, art lovers, farmers, business owners, educators and community leaders. In any given year it takes approximately one hundred volunteers to implement the Fields Project nine-day event.

Working under the Fields Project is the sub-committee Community Arts Legacy (CAL). Continuing in the Lorado Taft legacy, CAL has adopted a program of placing ten sculptures within ten years in Oregon. The first of these sculptures was placed in 2005 and they have followed with another installation each year. Contributions to CAL are tax deductible to the full extent allowed by law.

Oregon, Illinois is a community of 4,100 located on the banks of the Rock River where IL Rt. 64 and IL Rt. 2 meet, 100 miles west of Chicago, 35 miles south of Rockford, and 20 miles north of the Dixon Exit off the IL 88 tollway, 75 miles southeast of Galena, IL, 125 miles north of Bloomington, 85 miles east of the Quad-Cities area and 100 miles south of Madison, WI. Ogle County covers 757 square miles with a population of 50,511.
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