Graphic design student puts her ‘heart’ into Kansas City sculpture exhibit

A Northwest Missouri State University student is one of 150 artists whose creative work is featured throughout the Kansas City metropolitan area this summer during its “Parade of Hearts.” 

The design proposal submitted last year by Anna Case, a senior graphic design major from St. Joseph, Missouri, was selected from nearly 500 submissions for the cultural art experience. In April, her finished sculpture, titled “From Kansas City, With Love,” was placed at Nick and Jake’s restaurant in Shawnee, Kansas, and will remain there through August, when the sculptures move into private ownership through an online auction.

“I am so proud of the work that Anna has done to draw attention to an organization that provides vital medical relief in international disaster zones,” Karen Britt, a Northwest associate professor of art, said. “She is not only a talented artist but also a good citizen.”

The process, which Case called “intense and deeply rewarding,” began when family members tipped her off about the opportunity last summer. They encouraged her to submit a design as Kansas City plans to welcome an estimated 650,000 visitors from throughout the world to the region for this summer’s FIFA World Cup activities.

“Then my grandma, like an hour later, also sent it to me, so ‘Oh, maybe this is a sign that I should do it,’” Case said. “So just on a whim, not really expecting anything, I came up with a design.”

Her design for the two-sided sculpture showcases iconic Kansas City landmarks and traditions on a series of postcard stamps.

“Growing up, I would go visit Kansas City, so it has a very special place in my heart, even though I grew up in St. Joe,” Case said. “It’s just a very nostalgic place for me, and so I made a list of everything I could think of, and then I narrowed it down to 16 of the main things that I wanted to represent in my sculpture.”

Once her design was selected, Case worked “virtually every hour” during Northwest’s Thanksgiving and winter breaks to paint the sculpture. Each sculpture has a circular design with a heart-shaped opening in the center. They measure 6 feet tall and 6 feet wide while weighing about 400 pounds.

“Luckily, a friend was very willing to let us paint inside her shed because it would not fit inside my house,” Case said. “I had to try to balance being a student as well as painting this giant sculpture, so I just went and painted every day.”

She added, “I’ve never painted anything this big before; it was huge. I had to climb on a ladder to paint some parts of it. Coming up with the design for it was not super difficult, but the execution of ‘What kind of paint do I use?’ ‘What kind of brushes do I get?’ How many layers of paint am I going to have to do?’ A lot is the answer. A lot of layers of paint.”

In February, Case drove the sculpture to a storage facility for final preparation. In April, she attended an unveiling ceremony, where all of the sculptures were showcased at the Overland Park Convention Center before being moved to their summer locations.

Case’s sculpture is sponsored by Heart to Heart International, a non-profit healthcare organization that provides supplies to communities affected by natural disasters and humanitarian crises throughout the world.

Case met representatives of Heart to Heart at the unveiling ceremony, and the organization’s decision to sponsor her sculpture warmed her – pun intended – heart.

“They thought that my heart perfectly represented their mission because they’re sending things from Kansas City in the mail – which is kind of the theme of mine – out to the world with love,” Case said. “They’ve just been really lovely to get to know and work alongside.”

Case takes pride in being selected to participate in such a significant art exhibit with the large audience the “Parade of Hearts” will attract. She also enjoys seeing photos of people – and their pets – with her sculpture on social media.  

“It’s just really cool to see people’s reaction because I’m a graphic design major, and so I feel like with graphic design, sometimes you won’t see what people think of a design that you’ve made for a company,” she said. “But seeing people’s live reactions at the public unveiling was super special.”

Case plans to complete her bachelor’s degree at Northwest next spring and says the University has provided her with valuable faculty support and profession-based experiences to help her grow into a well-rounded artist. Outside of her coursework, she is active with The Lighthouse campus ministry and as a cartoonist and designer for the Northwest Missourian student newspaper.

She is working this summer in a graphic design and illustration internship with Tyndale House Publishers in Chicago. After Northwest, she aspires to have a career in the publishing industry with a goal of someday writing and illustrating children's books.

“I applied to a lot of different colleges in the area, and I toured a lot, but none of their art programs stood out as much as Northwest did,” Case said. “We have the traveling art lectures, and we have a really nice art facility, and they just take the arts and media very seriously. If I’m going to put money into an education, I want to feel valued as an artist, and I felt like Northwest did that.”