Dignity of Earth and Sky honors South Dakota’s Native American roots

Driving east on South Dakota’s stretch of Interstate 90, there is plenty for motorists to admire. The Black Hills. The Badlands. The Missouri River.

Just east of the Missouri River, near Chamberlain, one stainless steel structure has attracted motorists’ attention since it was installed in 2016: a Native American woman enveloped in a star quilt overlooking I-90 and the country’s longest river from atop a bluff.

The 50-ft.-tall “Dignity of Earth and Sky” sculpture–often shortened to Dignity—is one of Dale Lamphere’s most recognizable pieces of work in a career that stretches back more than five decades. It is a project that he said honors his home state’s Native American community and demonstrates what can be done with stainless steel.

About Dignity

More than 50 years ago, Lamphere participated in a semester at sea program as a college student. He hadn’t traveled much before that. “I'd never even been to a museum,” Lamphere said.

The opportunity allowed him to see the role art and artifacts play in other countries and cultures, and that stayed with him throughout his career. It can be seen in Dignity, which he’s described as honoring the Great Plains’ Native American roots and recognizing the beauty and resilience of the Dakota and Lakota people.

“Native women are the backbone of the society,” Lamphere said about the positive message he wanted to convey with the sculpture.

The 12-ton sculpture is made from about 1,000 pieces of fabricated stainless steel—a “3D puzzle, in that sense,” Lamphere said. Some of the pieces are perforated metal, which allow interior LED lighting to emanate from the sculpture. The star quilt, made from 128 diamond-shaped pieces, wraps around the metal figure, with some of the diamonds chosen to match the colors of the water and sky.

The sculpture required some engineering and previsualization for it to become reality. Lamphere made a scale model so he could picture what the final version would look like. And he designed the star quilt’s with winds and lighting in mind.

“Even though [Dignity] has a 32-ft.-wide star quilt, the wind can move right through these diamonds that make up the quilt. They’re offset in various ways so the wind moves through them, and sunlight can illuminate them,” he said.

A tripod-like system keeps Dignity stationary, with one pipe going down each leg and one up the back. The simple and elegant design is hidden from view and does not impact the visual aspects of the sculpture, Lamphere said.

The project required 14 months of fabrication. Workers TIG welded the sculpture.

“We TIG weld all these things. It keeps the spatter down and gives us a nice clean weld,” he said.

“As every fabricator knows, large-scale projects are team efforts,” Lamphere added. “Without the assistance of some fantastic expert welders and fabricators, it wouldn’t be possible to do any number of things that are in the world today—it’s an important vocation.”

Beyond Dignity

Lamphere’s work—which now totals more than 70 large public sculptures—can be found in communities across the country.

While Dignity is massive in size and scope, Lamphere has gone even bigger. In Sioux Falls, S.D., his “Arc of Dreams” sculpture, which was installed in 2019, spans the Big Sioux River. Two 150-ft. stainless steel crescents stretch across the river and nearly touch high above the water, but they are separated by a 15-ft.-long gap.

In 2021, Lamphere unveiled “The Hive,” a 20-ft.-tall sculpture at Black Hills State University in Spearfish, S.D. The stainless steel piece depicts a yellow jacket hive, a nod to the university’s mascot—a yellowjacket.

And last spring, Lamphere’s 24-ft., 4-ton “St. Clare” statue was installed at St. Francis Hospital-Interquest in Centennial, Colo.

“‘St. Clare’ will greet patients, visitors, and caregivers with open arms at the front entrance on the east side of the hospital,” said the hospital’s description of the sculpture. “At night, she will shine as LED lights stream through the weatherproof structure from within. ‘St. Clare’’s light will remind us that God is with us, even in our darkest moments.”

A common theme among his body of work? Stainless steel.

“So much can happen with stainless steel,” he said. “It’s such a wonderful material to work with, and it has such durability.”