I’d passed this statue for years. Once I knew it was a Kishel, I couldn’t believe I’d overlooked it. Skreee! That’s the sound my brakes made as they went from “kind of need replaced” to “tin foil.” I had to stop and learn more about it.
I’ve written about Dick Kishel several times before. Born in Minnesota in 1923, he came to Muncie in 1953 to teach at Ball State and Burris Laboratory School. He later founded Art Forms, a company that produced concrete and fiberglass sculptures under the “Play Forms” brand before expanding into industrial plastics1.
Kishel’s work ranged from intimate church sculptures to oversized roadside icons. He created Muncie’s 32-foot Paul Bunyan and the famous Frank-‘N’-Stein restaurant statues in Northwest Indiana2, among other installations. In 1964, Art Forms produced most of the fiberglass figures for Indianapolis’ Washington Park Zoo3! Those efforts included Willie the Whale, now preserved in Kokomo’s Foster Park4.
I knew all about Dick Kishel and his public art, but I didn’t know much about the church his piece adorns. Fountain Square United Methodist Church dates to 1910, when it was founded in a saloon at Willard Street and Macedonia Avenue on the south side of Muncie. The church, home to about 170 members in 19975, moved to its present location at 4495 South Madison Street in 1957. Although it later had plans to build a new sanctuary at Cowan Road and the Muncie Bypass6, the congregation remained on Madison Street- the same property where Kishel’s sculpture would become one of its most recognizable landmarks.
Kishel’s eleven-foot statue of Christ was installed at Fountain Square in 1981. Well-known around the midwest by then7, Kishel created the statue that featured Christ holding a lamb and shepherds crook aside the mother sheep with 3/8” steel rods covered in fiberglass. Despite his opinion of what Jesus may have looked like, Kishel admitted he had no skills when it came to sheep. Sculpting them necessitated a visit to a farm8.
At first, Kishel made a three-foot model of the sculpture. After consultations with the brass at Fountain Square, he determined that the final statue would have to be light-colored for visibility9. Maybe someone will pipe up with what kind of finish he used. Gel coat? Hot coat? Regular old paint?
The Shepherd strikes an interesting balance between sacred art and modernist sculpture. Rather than pursuing strict realism, Kishel distilled the figure into clean, simplified forms while preserving a human warmth. I’m no art critic, but to my eye, the shepherd is unusually tall and slender. The eyes convey compassion and contemplation as they gaze downward toward the viewer.
Meanwhile, the sheep are far more textured than the main figure itself, with rough, deeply-textured wool contrasting with its smooth garments. Overall, the sculpture feels distinctly modern without losing its warmth. Kishel used simplified forms and exaggerated proportions to create something that looks peaceful instead of imposing. I had to nab a photo of this sheep because that’s exactly how my cat Zulu looks at me when she burrows her way into my lap.
Dick Kishel left his mark all over Indiana and the greater midwest, but one of his finest works has been hiding in plain sight on Muncie’s south side for more than forty years. I drove past The Shepherd for years without really seeing it. Now it’s one of my favorite pieces of public art in Muncie! That’s the reward for slowing down every once in a while: sometimes the most interesting stories aren’t hidden in abandoned schools, theaters, or factories. Instead, they’ve been standing beside a busy road all along.
Sources Cited
1 Jones, M. (1964, October 25). Concrete Turtles Set Pace for Fast Rise of 8-Year-Old Plastics Company. The Muncie Star. p. 35.
2 Frankensteins Come Big at this Man’s Workshop (1965, December 19). The Muncie Star. p. 37.
3 Davis, S. (1964, March 12). Fantasy Land Built in Muncie Shop. The Muncie Star. p. 19
4 Willie the Whale (n.d.). Atlas Obscura. Web. Retrieved July 26, 2026.
5 Communities of Faith (1997, June 14). The Muncie Star Press. p. 21.
6 (See footnote 6).
7 Kishel, M. (2020, June 23). Now that’s one heck of a doggone story! Arrowhead Plastic Engineering [Muncie]. Web. Retrieved August 3, 2026.
8 Terhune, B. (1981, April 25). Statue is created for church. The Muncie Evening Press. p. 8.
9 (See footnote 8).
