Rebekah (Soft Wind), Bernard Emerson Frazier

Archive Label 1999:
Bernard “Poco” Frazier, born in 1906 on a farm in Western Kansas, attended KU from 1925 to 1929. Frazier’s early experiences on the Kansas prairie first inspired his love for Kansas clay and stone, a love that later formed the basis for his work as a sculptor. Frazier’s work is also represented in KU’s most famous landmark, the Memorial Campanile. He sculpted two sets of bronze doors for the memorial: the south doors that consider the emotions and tragedies of war, and the north doors that record aspects of the state’s history.

Here Frazier personifies the south wind in the form of a young girl. The south wind is the translation of “Kansas,” from the word “kanze” used by many tribes indigenous to this region. The same approach to capturing the essence of the “People of the South Wind” can be seen in the “Equality and Freedom” panel of the Campanile doors, where the men who fought for freedom and those who were then freed are inexorably linked.

Archive Label 2001:
Born in Athol, Kansas, Frazier graduated from the University of Kansas in 1929 and later studied art in Chicago. He returned to KU in 1940 and taught in the fine arts department for almost 40 years. Among his accomplishments are the designs for KU's Memorial Campanile bronze doors. He also attempted to extract clay from KU's Mount Oread. This piece probably resulted from these experiments with native Kansas materials.

Archive Label 1999:
Frazier was a University of Kansas faculty member from 1940 until retirement in 1976, except during 1944-50 when he served as director of the Philbrook Art Center in Tulsa. Frazier was a KU graduate, proud that he was "the first man to graduate from Design" in 1929. He established the first courses in sculpture at KU and completed many monumental commissions, including the bronze doors of the KU Campanile and pediment sculptures on the Capitol in Topeka.

From 1935-39, Frazier served as sculptor-in-residence at KU. With scientists from the Kansas Geological Survey, he experimented with local clays and glazes, which led to the development of Kansaware pottery. Although the KU design department's emphasis was on functional, industrial applications of ceramics, Frazier sought a sculptural, artistic expression using native materials.